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Published in electronic format in the U.S.A.

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Acknowledgments

Complete Curriculum’s K-12 curriculum been team-developed by a consortium of teachers, administrators, educational and subject matter specialists, graphic artists and editors.

In a collaborative environment, each professional participant contributed to ensuring the quality, integrity and effectiveness of each Compete Curriculum resource was commensurate with the required educational benchmarks and contemporary standards Complete Curriculum had set forth at the onset of this publishing program. �

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Table of Contents

Lesson�1��Introduction�to�Science��Objective:�Students�will�become�familiar�with�procedures�for�experiments.��Lesson�2��Are�All�Plants�Alike?��Objective:�Students�will�practice�observing�and�classifying.��Lesson�3��What�Do�Plants�Have�In�Common?��Objective:�Students�will�learn�the�parts�of�a�cell�for�plants�and�animals.��Lesson�4��How�Are�Plants�Classified?��Objective:�Students�will�recognize�how�plants�are�placed�in�groups.��Lesson�5��More�Life�Classified��Objective:�Students�will�read�about�and�learn�the�animal�phylum�and�fungus.��Lesson�6��Other�Organisms��Objective:�Students�will�learn�about�the�protist�kingdom�and�bacteria.�

Lesson�7�Plants�Help�and�Hurt�Objective:�Students�learn�of�a�harmful�plant�and�pull�together�the�information�about�plants�and�their�parts.�

Lesson�8��How�Do�Parts�of�a�Plant�Help�it�Survive?��Objective:�Students�will�learn�that�plants�have�different�parts�that�have�separate�functions�for�the�life�of�the�plant.�

Lesson�9��What�About�the�Stem�of�a�Plant?��Objective:�Students�will�learn�about�parts�of�a�plant.��

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Lesson�10��Parts�of�a�Leaf��Objective:�Students�will�learn�parts�of�the�plant.��Lesson�11��Three�Things�Plants�Need��Objective:�Students�will�recall�what�they�have�learned�in�the�last�few�lessons�about�plants.��Lesson�12��Plants�Need...��Objective:�Students�will�observe�what�happens�when�there�is�no�sunlight�for�the�leaf�of�a�plant.��Lesson�13��How�Does�Photosynthesis�Work?��Objective:�Students�will�look�more�thoroughly�at�the�process�of�photosynthesis.��

Lesson�14��The�Beauty�of�Autumn!�Objective:�Students�will�learn�why�leaves�turn�colors�in�the�fall.��Lesson�15��What�Parts�of�the�Plant�Do�We�Eat?��Objective:�Students�learn�more�about�the�plant�foods�we�eat.��Lesson�16��Review�Assessment��Objective:�Students�will�demonstrate�their�knowledge�of�plants.�

Lesson 17 Life cycles Objective: Students will learn about plants with seeds and those without.

Lesson 18 The making of a new plant Objective: Students will follow the life cycle of the moss and fern plants.

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Lesson 19 How long have these plants lived? Objective: Students learn about how plants adapt and continue their classifications for years.

Lesson 20 What do we know about seed plants? Objective: Students learn some seeds are on cones and other inside fruits.

Lesson 21 Which kind of tree produces my fruit? Objective: Students look at the angiosperms.

Lesson 22 What are cotyledons? Objective: Students will learn about the one and two parts of seeds.

Lesson 23 How do you know there is a flower nearby? Objective: Students will learn why flowers have an aromas.

Lesson 24 Fertilized flowers produce seeds Objective: Students learn the names for the parts of the flower.

Lesson 25 Pollination/Fertilization Objective: Students will learn about self-pollination and cross-pollination.

Lesson 26 What is in a seed? Objective: Students will learn the parts and functions of plant seed.

Lesson 27 How does a conifer live? Objective: Students will read about the life cycle of a conifer.

Lesson 28 Review and enrichment Objective: Students will research more vegetative propagation plants.

Lesson 29 What are Tropisms? Objective: Students will learn how plants adapt to their environment.

Lesson 30 How Do Plants Survive? Objective: Students will learn more about the adaptations plants have to make to survive in various environments.

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Lesson 31 How are animals alike or different? Objective: Students will learn how to classify animals.

Lesson 32 What do scientists use to classify organisms? Objective: Students will learn that scientists use the term vertebrates and invertebrates to classify animals.

Lesson 33 What animals are in the vertebrate groups? Objective: Students will learn about the vertebrate groups.

Lesson 34 Life cycle Objective: To learn the metamorphosis of an animal.

Lesson 35 How animals adapt? Objective: Students learn how animals adapt to their environment.

Lesson 36 Who is my mother? Objective: Students will learn about heredity in the animal’s world.

Lesson 37 Review your lessons Objective: Students will review their lesson by answering questions in this lesson.

Lesson 38 What do living things need to survive? Objective: Students will consider the needs of animals to survive on Earth.

Lesson 39 What is an Ecosystem? Objective: Students will learn what elements make up an abiotic and a biotic environment.

Lesson 40 Prairies Objective: Students will learn about the prairie ecosystem.

Lesson 41 The organization of living things Objective: Students learn more about the dependent of living and nonliving things.

Lesson 42 What if a habitat changes? Objective: Students will consider what happens when habitats change.

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Lesson 43 The Food Chain Objective: Students look at the food chain.

Lesson 44 What is a food web? Objective: Students will learn more about the cycle of foods.

Lesson 45 Competition is on! Objective: Students will learn about how living organisms compete for food to survive.

Lesson 46 What is the pyramid for the food chain? Objective: Students will visualize the level of living organisms in the food chain.

Lesson 47 Are you affected by the food chain? Objective: Students realize how important the health of the web chain is for humans.

Lesson 48 Healthy you; you the consumer! Objective: Students will consider what foods are required for their health.

Lesson 49 How does water change forms? Objective: Students will consider the water cycle.

Lesson 50 How are trees recycled? Objective: Students come to understand all living things recycle.

Lesson 51 What is the carbon and nitrogen cycle? Objective: Students will follow the carbon and nitrogen cycle.

Lesson 52 Why should we recycle? Objective: Students will think about recycling and recalling natures recycle systems.

Lesson 53 Rainforest of the Sea and a Review Objective: Students will learn about the endangered coral reef; they will also do a review of the last lessons.

Lesson 54 How much room is there on the Earth for all the communities of life? Objective: Students will learn about the factors that contribute

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Lesson 55 How do some animals survive? Objective: Students will learn that some animals survive by living off other living organisms.

Lesson 56 What is the host? Objective: Students continue learning about the relationships of plants and animals in nature.

Lesson 57 Do living things survive the changes to the Earth? Objective: Students consider how the Earth changes challenged the life of some organisms.

Lesson 58 Six Major Biomes Objective: Students learn the six major biomes and how to identify each of them.

Lesson 59 A Closer Look Objective: Students will look more carefully at two of the biomes.

Lesson 60 How are they alike and different? Objective: Students will go on to learn more about two biomes.

Lesson 61 Two more biomes... Objective: Students will read more about the deciduous forest and the tropical rain forests.

Lesson 62 How About Water.... Objective: Students read and consider the life of different types of animals in the Earth’s water.

Lesson 63 Think and Write Objective: Students will review the biomes they have read about.

Lesson 64 Ecosystems....how they change Objective: Students recognize the changes of ecosystems.

Lesson 65 Changes in the Earth change populations Objective: Students learn about some changes that people have to make because of the Earth’s ecosystems.

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Lesson 66 Review Lessons Objective: Students will demonstrate their knowledge of biomes.

Lesson 67 Earth's Neighbors Objective: Students will experiment with how the planets stay in their orbit around the sun.

Lesson 68 How are the planets kept in their orbit? Objective: Students will learn about the gravity of the Solar System.

Lesson 69 What is inertia? Objective: Students will read about more situations where they can recognize inertia.

Lesson 70 EARTH SCIENCE Spinning planets Objective: Students will consider how a day is measured for the planets

Lesson 71 The surface of the Earth Objective: Students will learn about the surface of the Earth.

Lesson 72 What are constellations? Objective: Students can learn a little about other things in space.

Lesson 73 How does the crust of the Earth change? Objective: Students will learn more about the crust of the Earth and how it changes.

Lesson 74 Forces in the Crust Objective: Students will learn more about the action of the crust of the Earth.

Lesson 75 Are there other forces that shape the Earth? Objective: Students learn about forces on top of the crust that affects it.

Lesson 76 What about the glaciers of the Earth? Objective: Students will focus on erosion of the Earth via wind, ice and rocks.

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Lesson 77 How about the surface of the Moon? Objective: Students will learn how the surface of the Moon changes.

Lesson 78 What can we find in the crust of the Earth? Objective: Students will learn more about the minerals of the Earth.

Lesson 79 How do they form? Objective: Students learn about the formation of minerals in the crust of the Earth.

Lesson 80 How else can you identify minerals? Objective: Students learn that you use streak, hardness and cleavage to identify minerals.

Lesson 81 How are minerals used? Objective: Students will learn more about how minerals of the Earth are used.

Lesson 82 Treasure chests... Objective: Students will learn the classifications of rocks.

Lesson 83 What are sedimentary rocks? Objective: Students will learn how sedimentary rocks are formed and how they are different.

Lesson 84 One more kind of rock... Objective: Students will learn about how rocks can change with heat and pressure and form a

third type of rock.

Lesson 85 What do we find in our soil? Objective: Students continue to learn about the surface of the Earth.

Lesson 86 How do we care for soil? Objective: Students will think about pollution and how farmers care for the soil.

Lesson 87 The Rock Cycle Objective: Students will think about the life of a rock.

Lesson 88 Review Quiz on Rocks Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding of rocks and the Earth’s surface.

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Lesson 89 What else supports life on planet Earth? Objective: Students will study the atmosphere.

Lesson 90 What is in the air besides oxygen? Objective: Students understand more about the atmosphere.

Lesson 91 Why are the trees yellow? Objective: Students learn about acid rain and pollution.

Lesson 92 How can we reduce pollution? Objective: Students think about ways to protect the atmosphere.

Lesson 93 Explore Water Objective: Students will do an experiment concerning water and what happens when it evaporates.

Lesson 94 Do we use ocean water? Objective: Students will learn how we have learned to prepare and use salt water.

Lesson 95 The Water Cycle Objective: Students learn the terms used for the water cycle.

Lesson 96 How can people pollute water? Objective: Students will read about the pollution of water and how to purify it.

Lesson 97 More about our oceans Objective: Students will think further about the life of our salt waters.

Lesson 98 What features are under the ocean?Objective: Students will learn the terms for the ocean floor features.

Lesson 99 What are Ocean Currents? Objective: Students will learn what the ocean current is and what causes them.

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Lesson 100 How Water Moves Objective: Students will understand how water moves in waves.

Lesson 101 How heat is transmitted to our Earth Objective: Students learn how the directions of the sunrays affect the heat of the Earth.

Lesson 102 Does the time of day affect heat? Objective: Students will learn more about how heat is kept near the Earth; atmosphere.

Lesson 103 How is the air affected by sunlight? Objective: Students learn about the layers of the atmosphere and how it affects the temperature of the Earth and thus weather.

Lesson 104 What causes weather? Objective: Students consider the elements that make up the troposphere and cause weather.

Lesson 105 Is there water in the air? Objective: Students learn more about how water transfers from things to the air.

Lesson 106 A “bad” hair day! Objective: Students learn about relative humidity.

Lesson 107 What do you see in a cloud? Objective: Students learn how to recognize different kinds of clouds.

Lesson 108 How about wind; what makes it blow? Objective: Students will learn about wind or the flow of air on Earth.

Lesson 109 Review lessons about air, wind and clouds Objective: Students will take a quiz on the facts that have been presented in the last few lessons.

Lesson 110 Weather Forecasting Objective: Students will get more information about air masses and fronts.

Lesson 111 What kinds of air fronts are there? Objective: The students will learn the names of four different types of air masses.

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Lesson 112 Thunderstorms in stages Objective: Students will learn about thunderstorms and their stages of development.

Lesson 113 What is a hurricane? Objective: Students learn about hurricane and how they are formed.

Lesson 114 What is a tornado? Objective: Students learn about tornadoes and how they are formed.

Lesson 115 How are storms tracked? Objective: Students learn about the radars that track storms.

Lesson 116 ClimateObjective: Students will learn that a long-term weather pattern is determined by climates, which can change.

Lesson 117 The things that affect climate Objective: Students learn that affect temperature and precipitation over a period of time.

Lesson 118 Sun's Energy Objective: Students learn about how the Earth gains and loses energy.

Lesson 119 Health and climate! Objective: Students think about how the climate can affect people.

Lesson 120 Review Quiz Objective: Students will take a review quiz on climate and weather.

Lesson 121 Spin it around yourself! Objective: Students will read more about Newton’s Law and unbalanced forces.

Lesson 122 What are the properties of matter? Objective: Students will learn the terms: matter, mass, volume and weight while understanding the properties of matter.

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Lesson 123 How fast does a mass move? Objective: Students will learn that the more matter the harder it is to set it in motion.

Lesson 124 Race the cars... Objective: Students learn about force and inertia.

Lesson 125 Force is needed to maintain motion..... Objective: Students learn about what resistance there is to keep a mass in motion.

Lesson 126 How fast are we going? Objective: Students learn the concepts of speed, velocity and acceleration.

Lesson 127 Why do things stay in motion? Objective: Students wonder about how objects stay in motion.

Lesson 128 Newton's Second and Third Laws Objective: As the net force acting on an object increases, the object accelerates more.

Lesson 129 What affects acceleration? Objective: Net force acting on an object increases; the object accelerates more.

Lesson 130 What does the letter F stand for when considering motion? Objective: Second Newton’s Law: an unbalanced force acts on an object, the object’s acceleration equals the force divided by the object’s mass.

Lesson 131 What about rockets? Objective: Students will consider more about the forces that push and pull against an object.

Lesson 132 Action vs. Reaction Objective: Newton’s third law: for every action there is an equal but opposite reaction.

Lesson 133 Spin it around yourself! Objective: Students will read more about Newton’s Law and unbalanced forces.

Lesson 134 How do forces affect us? Objective: Students will learn about how different forces affect people.

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Lesson 135 Why do things fall? Objective: Students consider the weight of the object to predict how fast it is pulled by gravity.

Lesson 136 Does air make a difference? Objective: The force that pulls us to the ground is the same force that keeps the Moon and Earth in orbit.

Lesson 137 What makes the apple fall off the tree? Objective: Students read more about weight.

Lesson 138 How can gravity be “universal”? Objective: Weight and mass determine the speed of a falling object.

Lesson 139 Does it ever help to add weight to something? Objective: Weight works for us in some circumstances.

Lesson 140 Reviewing gravity Objective: To recognize gravity pulls everything including the Moon and planets orbiting the Earth.

Lesson 141 What causes sound? Objective: Sound is created by the vibrations of objects.

Lesson 142 What is needed to make sound? Objective: Sound creates a vibration.

Lesson 143 What is pitch? Objective: Pitch and loudness are two characteristics of sound.

Lesson 144 How do humans hear sound? Objective: Students will learn more about the vibration of sounds.

Lesson 145 Sound volume Objective: Students will learn about the volume of sound.

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Lesson 146 Good Sound Objective: Students will continue thinking about sound.

Lesson 147 How do you record sound? Objective: Students will read about how sound is captured.

Lesson 148 What materials are the best reflectors of sound? Objective: Students will investigate different materials to see what reflects sound.

Lesson 149 Bounce or reflect? Objective: Sounds vary because objects reflect, absorb, or transmit sound differently.

Lesson 150 Speed of Sound Objective: Students will learn about the speed of sound.

Lesson 151 How does sonar work? Objective: Students will learn about sonar waves and how they are used.

Lesson 152 How can you tell the difference in voices? Objective: Students will learn more about sound frequency.

Lesson 153 Review and Remember Objective: Students will be quizzed on their understanding of sound.

Lesson 154 Can you see without light? Objective: Light is a form of energy that is reflected from some objects.

Lesson 155 How does light travel? Objective: Students learn the path of light energy.

Lesson 156 How does a mirror reflect light? Objective: Students look at how light reflects in a mirror.

Lesson 157 Can we curve the light rays? Objective: Students learn how light rays are curved.

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Lesson 158 Mirror, mirror on the Wall.......... Objective: Mirrors can be used for many things.

Lesson 159 Look at the time line of the light bulb Objective: Students will learn more about the improvements in light bulbs

Lesson 160 Explore light passing through mass Objective: Students look at what kinds of materials light may pass through versus what will cast a shadow.

Lesson 161 What can light pass through? Objective: Students will learn that light is blocked by some objects and passes through others.

Lesson 162 Can light rays be bent? Objective: Students learn about refraction.

Lesson 163 How Do Lenses Work? Objective: Students will learn about the lens in telescopes.

Lesson 164 Eyes, eyes, eyes Objective: Students will think about how the eye works.

Lesson 165 Rethink what happens to light Objective: Students will review what they learned and use it for a report.

Lesson 166 History of the camera Objective: Students read about how the camera works.

Lesson 167 Does a red object always look red? Objective: Work with color to discover more about its properties.

Lesson 168 How do we get the color from white? Objective: White light is a combination of all colors.

Lesson 169 Colors Objective: Student, think further about white color and primary colors.

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Lesson 170 What happens when color is reflected? Objective: Where in nature can you see a spectrum?

Lesson 171 How do waves move? Objective: Waves that produce visible light are part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Lesson 172 Are all light waves the same? Objective: Students learn about electromagnetism.

Lesson 173 Invisible Wavelengths Objective: Students will learn about other types of light waves.

Lesson 174 What are lasers? Objective: Students learn more about a type of light energy: laser.

Lesson 175 Review Quiz Objective: Students will take a quiz on light energy.

Lesson 176 Review the concepts of light Objective: Students simply reread the basic information about light.

Lesson 177 Someone to know? Objective: Students will read about a nuclear physicist: science as a career.

Lesson 178 Your skeleton Objective: Learn about the skeletal human system.

Lesson 179 Two more systems of the body Objective: Students will read and learn more about the muscular and circulatory system.

Lesson 180 The Heart and Respiratory System Objective: Students will get a short introduction to the heart and respiratory systems.

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STUDENT MANUAL SCIENCE LESSON 1

Lesson 1 Life Science

How do we know anything about the Earth? How do we know dinosaurs lived? Inquisitive people like scientists have observed and recorded things they have found. Ascientist named Dr. Walter Alvarez studied clues to the existence of dinosaurs. Dr. Alvarez used the Methods of Science, which are the steps scientists follow to solveproblems.

Scientists communicate with one anotherand share information. Dr Alvarez hadbeen observing rocks because that iswhat a geologist does. They study theEarth’s crust. He found a layer of rockthat was full of fossils. He knew it wasformed millions of years ago. He found alayer of red rock just above the fossilrock. He knew that was formed after thefossils. His mind wanted to know if thisred rock had something to do with howthe dinosaurs died.

Scientific discovery begins with a goodquestion. Through measurements Dr. Alvarez found that the age of the rock showed itwas formed about the same time the dinosaurs died. A team of scientists studied the rockand discovered it had Iridium a metal that is rare on Earth. What has that metal? Meteorites are made of Iridium. Meteorites are rocky chunks of matter that travel throughspace and reach the Earth.

Based on fact and observation the doctor inferred that a meteorite had smashed into Earthabout the time the dinosaurs died out. When you infer you reason from evidence. Fromthis a hypothesis was formed. He stated that the meteorite was so big it caused a hugeexplosion when it hit the Earth. This is what killed the dinosaurs.

What is a hypothesis? It is a possible answer to a question. It must do three things: explain observations, be testable, and predict new findings.

A prediction states possible results of an experiment. A hypothesis is like saying“If…the…” statement. So if the meteorite killed the dinosaurs there should be some proofsomewhere on the Earth. So we predict that it did but now must find a way to test hishypothesis.

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Now the scientist can design an experiment to prove his theory. Scientists actually usevariables of something that can be changed or controlled. One rule is to try yourexperiment more than one time. Each time it should test only one variable at a time. Dr. Alvarez decided that the meteorite at least six miles wide to have this amount ofiridium. The scientists used a computer model. Models can show how real objects reactto changes in their environment.

Their computer models showed that this large a meteorite could have caused the disaster. When it hit the Earth it would have caused earthquakes and tidal waves. Shock waveswould have brought on hurricanes. There would have been wildfires caused by the debrisof the meteorite. The air would have been as hot as a furnace. Finally, the temperaturewould drop to far below freezing as dust blocked the sun.

Their next job was to observe. What they would be looking for a place on the Earth thathad a huge crater. It was in 1980 that the crater was found on the Yucatan Peninsula.The scientists collected data. The next step is to interpret the data. Most scientistsbelieve that Dr. Alvarez’s theory is correct.

When an experiment is complete there should be a conclusion: was the hypothesiscorrect or not. If it is not scientists create new experiments to test their theories. The scientific method is used in simple experiments as well as complex problems. You may be asked to do an experiment during your course of science. You will be askedto observe, question, form a hypothesis, experiment and come to a conclusion. When you observe you use all of your senses and identify or learn about an object orevent.

You infer to form an idea from the facts observed. You may have to classify things ormeasure results. Your prediction is what you like is true. It is from this you form ahypothesis. A hypothesis is a statement that can be tested to answer a question. Think about what variables that could change your results; like it was too cold or too warmor too close or too far away.

The experiment is the test you perform.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned the terms used in creating an experiment.

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Lesson 2 Are all plants alike?

Plants and especially flowering plants are beautiful to look at. Have you ever really lookedclosely at different kinds of plants? There are trees, shrubs, grasses, fruits, andvegetables that are easy to identify. How about seaweeds? Have you seen it and couldyou identify it if you did see it?

What you are to do in this lesson is to take a deeper look at different kinds of plants. Youare looking to see if a fern, moss and a flowering plant have any traits that are the sameand if not what is different. You need to use your eyes to observe and draw what yousee.

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Lesson 2 Are all plants alike?

Name: _________________________________________________Date: ____________

Procedure: You have three plants. Observe each plant As you observe draw the plant and write a description of each one.

Place a leaf of one of the plant on the microscope or flat glass surface.Put a drop of water on the leaf. Now observe that leaf. Draw what you see.

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Draw Conclusions:

What plant traits can you observe without a magnifying glass or microscope?

What other plant traits can you observe with the magnifying glass or microscope?Define: _______________________________

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From you observation, come up with your own definition of a plant.Hypothesize: ________________________________________________________________________

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Look at the other kinds of plants with the microscope or magnifying glass. Do all theplants seem to have the same traits? Do plants that look similar have the same traits? How would you set up an experiment to find out?

From your other science studies you already know some things about plants. Is thereanything you see that makes you wonder why some plants look different?

Scientists define things through observation and then put together descriptions of things innature. This is part of the scientific method.

Lesson Wrap Up: Observation helps in defining nature.

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Lesson 3 What Plants Have in Common?

Just by observing you can see that plants are green. It is the chlorophyll in the plant cellthat makes them green. This allows the plant to use the sun’s energy to make its ownfood. Plants also must have water, minerals from the soil and carbon dioxide from the airto produce its own food.

If you had a microscope you would be able to see the box like shapes in the leaf of a plant. Plants are made up of many different kinds of cells. All of the cells have parts that are thesame.

A tree has to have rigid cells to help it survive, as it grows so tall. It has to have roots toanchor it in the soil. The trunk supports all of its weight.

The cells of a plant look like boxes because it has a rigid cell wall. This is what helps itstand tall and not collapse. There are also tissues that organize the carrying of water andminerals to the plant. These we experience when we eat stringy celery or feel in fleshyfruits.

Each type of cell in a plant has a job to do. You have the cells in the leaves that help withfood production. There needs to be stems, branches, roots and trunk cells too. This ishow the food is transported throughout the plant. Now you will use the words in the vocabulary list to label the parts of a cell as you design aplant and animal cell.

After you are finished following these directions note what animal cells are missing; that iswhat is in a plant cell but not an animal cell.

Imagine a paper plate represents a cell. Plant cells are not round but the inside of theplate can be designed the structure of a plant cell.

First draw the cell: Use a black pencil to form the shape of a plant cell; slightly rigidwith more straight lines like a square.

Label this: Cell Wall…rigid structure surrounding the plant cell With a light green colored pencil, draw a line inside the cell wall line. Label this: cell membrane…holds the cell together With a light blue color draw something that is shaped like a kidney bean in the

center of the cell. Label this: Vacuole…storage space for food, water, and waste With a red pencil draw something about the size of a jellybean close to but not

touching the vacuole. You may have more than one red mitochondrion. Label this: Mitochondrion…cell energy processor; helps supply energy for the cell With a purple pencil draw a circle. Color it in a lighter color purple and put a few

curved lines around the circle.

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Label this: Nucleus…cell control center; directs everything the cell does. Finally, draw jellybean shaped green things all around in the cell. Label this: chloroplast…contains chlorophyll

Add some piece of yarn inside the cell colored green: these are the tissues that helptransport food and are what cells are organized into.

Now with the other plate do the same thing for animal cells. With a brown pencil draw a circle inside the plate. Label this…Cell membrane With a purple pencil draw a circle, colored in with lighter purple and with curved

lines around it. Label this…Nucleus With a red pencil draw several jellybean shaped things inside the cell. Label these: Mitochondrion With a pink pencil draw several marbles shapes inside the cell. Label these: vacuole

When you have completed your two cell drawings, you may glue the jellybeans and beanson top of the parts you labeled. What is different about an animal cell?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students note the common characteristics of plants exist in their cells. Plants can make their own food.

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Lesson 3 What Plants Have in Common?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

My TWO CELL DRAWING

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Lesson 4 How Are Plants Classified?

Look carefully at a piece of celery. What do you see? Add water to fill a tall glass half full. Put some food coloring in the water. Place the stalk of celery in the water and wait a fewminutes. Observe the celery. What did you see? How did it change and what caused thechange.

From the beginning of time people have noticed differences in plant life and tried to explainwhat made the difference. They had to find out what plants were good to eat and whichwere not. They experimented with how plants could be used as a medicine.

Through visual observations scientists’ first classified plants into three simple groups: littleplants like herbs, bigger plants like shrubs and the biggest plants such as trees. Observingsize made this classification. They recognized the traits or characteristics of plants andrecorded what they saw.

Today scientists realize that size is only a small part of what makes plants different. A tinyblade of grass is more like a bamboo tree than moss that grows close to the ground. Now scientists look inside the plant to learn more about its characteristics.

First in the moss there are lots of cells packed together like a jigsaw puzzle. All the cellslook alike. Water gets into the plant by passing directly into the cells.

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Looking at a corn plant it can be observed that there are tube like systems in the leaves,stems and roots. Food is made in the leaf but moved into the whole plant through thesetubes known as vascular tissue. Scientists further divided plants into those that have thevascular system and those that do not.

Trees and flowering plants are classified as vascular plants. Vascular means composedof or containing vessels. Moss and other simple plants are nonvascular. All plants are putinto these two categories.

Plants in these two divisions are far from exactly the same. So scientist made a smallergroup within this division called a division. All plants with seed and vascular/ all plantswithout seeds and vascular is one division.

Examples: Vascular with seeds: conifers Vascular without seeds: fernsThen there are plants that flower and those that do not for another division.

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Lesson 4 How Are Plants Classified?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

What is the difference between a vascular plant and a nonvascular plant? Answer bywriting a paragraph describing the difference.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned that plants are divided into two groups: vascular andnonvascular.

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STUDENT MANUAL FIFTH GRADE SCIENCE LESSON 5

Lesson 5 More Life Things Classified!

Recall that one of the things that make animals different than plants is that animals cannot make their own food. They can move from one place to another.

All animals are in the animal kingdom. Then they are divided into two groups used to be more specific about animals.

The first level contains groups called phyla or phylum. The next level contains groups called classes.

So we have the Animal Kingdom divided into two phyla without backbones and one with backbones.

Can you remember some animals that fit into each of these phyla?

You are correct if you remembered fish, birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals with backbones. The animals with no backbones are: sponges, flatworms, Sea Anemones and crustaceans.

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Lesson 5 More Life Things Classified!

How are animals different than plants? There are plants that do not make their own food. One such plant is the fungus or fungi. Can you think of any plant that would fit in this group?

In the Fungus kingdom there are: yeasts, morels, mildews, molds, mushrooms, smuts and rusts. If you do not know what any of these look like you may want to look them up on the Internet or get a resource book from the library.

What is interesting to know about these plants is how helpful they are to our environment. The way these plants survive is by absorbing food from decaying dead organisms and wastes. Some fungi contain chemicals that help fight diseases in humans. Some fungi help bread rise or turn milk into cheese. It breaks down decaying plants and animals so living things can use that chemical. This helps our environment.

There is a negative side to fungi. Some are actually poisonous to people. Others may cause itchy diseases like athlete’s foot. Some spoil food. You may have seen black, fuzzy like growth in damp areas in a bathroom. This is not helpful and may cause people to sneeze, cough or get very sick.

To help remember these plants make a chart in your notebook.

Draw a line and put the title Fungus Kingdom on it.

Draw three lines down from the main line.

Under one line place the words: yeasts, morels, mildews

The second line would be molds

The third are mushrooms, smuts and rusts.

Now in your notebook list the ways that fungi can be helpful.

Lesson Wrap Up: Animals have phylum and plants have kingdoms such as the fungi.

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Lesson 6 Other organisms

Have you ever wondered what the green stuff is that is floating on top of still water? Is it alive? Actually it is. It is in the plant kingdom. It is called protist kingdom.

Some is slime mold. You know mold to grow on food. Since this type of plant does not make its own food it must feed off other things.

The protists kingdom is made up of some microscopic living things. They can only be seen with a microscope. The kingdom included living things that cannot be seen with your eye and some you can see such as seaweed and green pond scum. Some protists also live on land.

Some of the protists consist of one cell and they swim around looking for food. Others are made up of groups of the same cells that are linked together. An alga does not have to hunt for food. They have chlorophyll. They float on the water in the sunlight and make their own food. There are even one celled protist that contain chlorophyll and are able to make their own food.

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Lesson 6 Other organisms

Name: ________________________________________________Date:____________

To classify life in a kingdom there must be some common characteristics. From what you just read there are many differences, what is same? Through a microscope you would discover a dense structure called a nucleus. An envelope called the membrane surrounds this nucleus. This is the common feature or characteristic that classifies them in one kingdom.

Another very simple living thing is called bacteria. Some are helpful and some bacteria are harmful to both animals and plants.

One of the differences in them is how they are formed. One kind groups together in a chain or cluster. Other kinds do not. You can see bacteria with a microscope. Each bacterium has a single cell without a nucleus.

One of the types of bacterium lives in the stomach of a cow to aid in the digestion of its food. Another lives deep in the ocean where lava seeps through cracks on to the ocean floor.

The true bacteria kingdom has some unusual members. One such member lives in the fur of a polar bear. It is blue-green in color and is called cyanobacteria. The prefix of this word: cyano means blue.

If you have ever had a very sore throat and the doctor took a swab he might be looking for bacteria that caused your sore throat. The doctor would be looking for the “strep” bacterium. Other diseases caused by bacterium are some upset stomachs because of a food, tuberculosis, and pneumonia.

Now think about what you have read and respond to these questions in your notebook.

How are some protists like plants?

They are groups of the same cells that are linked together.

How are bacteria different than other plants and organisms?

Each bacterium has a single cell without a nucleus.

Lesson Wrap Up: There is a kingdom of living things called protists.

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Lesson 7 Plants help and hurt

Have you ever seen a vine growing on a building or house? It looks like it is climbing thewall. Most vines do not harm the buildings they grow on. But one time we had anExposition. It happened in 1876 during the Philadelphia Centennial. Many differentcountries had exhibits. The Japanese brought many unusual plants.

The plant they brought is known as the “Mile-a-Minute Vine”. They also call it “The Vinethat Ate the South”. The plant can actually grow 60 feet in a single summer and choke thelife out of other, weaker plants. It would die out in the winter.

It covers seven million acres of America’s southland. How could that happen, because thelittle purple flower is beautiful? It was used to decorate gardens and homes. Farmersgrew it to feed cows, sheep and other farm animals. They liked how it tasted. The planthas huge six foot long roots and grew to seven inches in diameter weighing up to fourhundred pounds. The roots hung on to the soil with a grip. This helped keep soil fromwashing away.

The problem was that no one expected the plant to thrive. It grew very well in wet rainyweather. It had no natural enemies so it grew and it grew rapidly. In Japan there wereinsect pests that kept the vine in “check”.

Today kudzu is labeled as a weed and can be controlled with weed killers.

Now let’s take a little review of the past few lessons. You may look back for informationyou may not recall.

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Lesson 7 Plants help and hurt

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

What do plants have in common?

A dense structure called a nucleus. An envelope called the membrane surrounds thisnucleus.

What is the same to animals, protists, fungi and bacteria? How are plants different?

One of the things that make animals different than plants is that animals cannot maketheir own food. They can move from one place to another.

What is different in vascular plants and nonvascular plants?

Trees and flowering plants are classified as vascular plants. Vascular means composed of or containing vessels. Moss and other simple plants are nonvascular. All plants are putinto these two categories.

Describe three characteristics of plants?

Plants are green. They make their own food. Plants also must have water, minerals fromthe soil and carbon dioxide from the air to produce its own food.

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How can plants from other countries become pests?

Plants can "take over" without the insect pests to control the overgrowth of the plant.

Write a paragraph telling what plants are important in your life, and explain why?

Answers will vary.

Extension: Spores are very small. They can be found in mushrooms. Take the cap of amushroom and look at the cap very carefully with a hand lens. Put the cap, with the underside facing down, on a piece of poster paper. Cover it with a bowl. After threehours, remove the bowl. Use the tiny spores you find and make designs on the posterpaper.

Lesson Wrap Up: There are many different kinds of plants, but they are all veryimportant. Without plants, life would be impossible on Earth. Almost everything you eatcomes from plants, or from animals that eat plants.

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Lesson 8 How Do the Parts of a plant help it survive?

Do you ever eat plant roots? I am sure you do. Consider the food parts of these plants. Beets, carrots, sweet potatoes, radishes, and turnips are the roots of different plants. How do roots help a plant to survive?

Most plants have roots that hold them in the ground. Some plants, like mosses, don’t have true roots. Mosses have root like structures that anchor them.

Roots keep plants in the ground. They keep the plant from being swept away by wind or water. Roots draw up to the plant minerals from the soil along with water. They store food for the plants. This is happens with those root plants you may eat.

The root pushes into the soil. The tender root is protested by a tough root cap.

Before reading further take a plain piece of paper and your colored pencils. Draw a

structure that is shape like a small carrot. On the very pointed end, draw small round pieces on the tip. Label this part as the root cap. Copy the definition for root cap from your vocabulary words.

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Once the first root gets set in the ground a few hairy branching roots grow on its sides. This is called a taproot. Add hairy roots on the sides of your taproot picture. Label one of the hairy roots you added as root hairs. Copy that definition.

Plants like grasses do not have taproots. They have fibrous roots.

Taproots grow deep into the ground. Fibrous roots spread out near the surface. They collect water where there is little rain. Fibrous roots can make huge networks. There are even aerial roots that never touch the ground. They get moisture from the air. There is even a root called a prop root. It grows at the bottom of the stem and helps to prop the plant up.

Now finish your picture of the root. Leave an opening to your root that you can add more structure. Color the outer side of your root a light yellow color. This is the epidermis; label that part and add the definition. You have two more parts to include in your picture. Just under the light yellow epidermis make several rows of light red circles that look like kernels of corn from the root cap to the top of your root. Label this the cortex of the root. Copy the definition of the cortex.

Finally the inside center of the root should be darker red color and shaped the same way. Make them where the center of the root would be. Label this part of the root xylem.

How do you think fibrous roots would help a plant grow in a dry or desert area?

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Lesson 8 How Do the Parts of a plant help it survive?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:______________

Take a plain piece of paper and your colored pencils. Draw a structure that is shape like a small carrot. On the very pointed end, draw small round pieces on the tip. Label this part as the root cap. Copy the definition for root cap from your vocabulary words.

Now finish your picture of the root. Leave an opening to your root that you can add more structure. Color the outer side of your root a light yellow color. This is the epidermis; label that part and add the definition. You have two more parts to include in your picture. Just under the light yellow epidermis make several rows of light red circles that look like kernels of corn from the root cap to the top of your root. Label this the cortex of the root. Copy the definition of the cortex.

Finally the inside center of the root should be darker red color and shaped the same way. Make them where the center of the root would be. Label this part of the root xylem

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How do you think fibrous roots would help a plant grow in a dry or desert area?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learn that parts of the plant roots.

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Lesson 9 What about the stem of a plant?

All plant stems have something in common. But if you touch some stems they are hardlike a tree and some have delicate and thin. How can they be alike in any way? No matter what, the job of the stem is to support the plant. They help the leaves reach theplaces they can get sunlight. Stems also transport water and minerals. Stems movefoods made in leaves to all other parts of the plant.

The part that moves the water and minerals up from roots is called the xylem.

Draw a circle with a green colored pencil. Draw another circle a little ways from theoutside circle. Use your lighter green color to draw the second circle made up of smallcircles with a darker line separating each circle. Label the darker colored circles cambium. Copy the definition for that label.

Now use another colored green or yellow and draw egg shaped cells all around under theinside circle. There should be small circles inside the egg shaped circles. These will belabeled xylem. Copy the definition.

The circles will also be labeled phloem. Copy these definitions.

Some stems do more than support a plant and give it a transportation system. Forexample, the stems of plants like potatoes and sugarcane store food for the plants to uselater. The stem of a cactus plants store water.

What are two ways in which all stems are similar?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about the function of the stems of plants.

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Lesson 9 What about the stem of a plant?

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Draw a circle with a green colored pencil. Draw another circle a little ways from theoutside circle. Use your lighter green color to draw the second circle made up of smallcircles with a darker line separating each circle. Label the darker colored circles cambium. Copy the definition for that label.

Now use another colored green or yellow and draw egg shaped cells all around under theinside circle. There should be small circles inside the egg shaped circles. These will belabeled xylem. Copy the definition.

The circles will also be labeled phloem. Copy these definitions.

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What are two ways in which all stems are similar?

The job of the stem is to support the plant. They help the leaves reach the places theycan get sunlight. Stems also transport water and minerals. Stems move foods made inleaves to all other parts of the plant.

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Lesson 10 Parts of a leaf

Do you ever just look at leaves? Do you live in a place where you have many trees with leaves that change color in the fall of the year? Do you think people eat leaves?

When you just notice leaves and look very closely you will observe that some grow as a single leaf and others have several leaves on a petiole, the part that holds the leaf. The single leaves are called simple leaves. The leaves that grow in a cluster are called compound leaves.

There are many parts to a leaf. The leaf helps to keep a plant alive. The outer part of a leaf is called the epidermis. The epidermis secretes a waxy coating called the cuticle. The cuticle helps keep water from leaving the leaf so it will not dry up. There are cells between the layers of epidermis. Imagine a sandwich with a piece of bread on each side and chloroplasts inside. It is kind of in the shape of jellybeans. These chloroplasts are the green food factory for the plant. These factories need sunlight, minerals, water and carbon dioxide to make food for the plant.

On the underside of the leaf there are stomata. These are like doors that can be opened and closed. Their job is to regulate how much water the plant has. When the plant needs to keep its water, there are two guard cells on the sides of the stomata that shrink and keep water in the leaf. When water needs to be release from the leaf, the guard cells swells and allows water out of the leaf. More important than that is the fact that it is the stomata that bring air into the plant and releases carbon dioxide back out. It is sort of like your nose.

Many leaves are flat and large so they can take in the sunlight. The needles of a pine tree are covered with wax to hold water in. The spines of a cactus plant help to protect it. The crunchy leaves of the onion are where food is stored.

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The roots of a plant are a long ways from the leaves but they work together. The roots bring the water up from the soil. The process of water moving through the plant is called transpiration. Think of the word: transportation when you think of the water being transported throughout the plant.

If you have a couple of different leaves to look at touch the bottoms and tops. Do they feel the same or differently? Usually leaves have what would be like a vein system on the bottom. This is where the water and food are carried.

It is interesting to look more closely at the shape of leaves. If you have some crayons and plain paper you could do a crayon-rub. Just place the leaf or leaves under the paper on a flat surface and rub your crayon all over it. Watch it take shape on your paper. Did you use the backside of the leaf? If so you should have observed the veins on the leaf.

Do you eat salad? Then you probably eat the leaf of a lettuce plant. Cabbage, parsley, and spinach are foods commonly eaten.

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Lesson 10 Parts of a leaf

Name: ____________________________________________Date:_________________

Answer the following questions.

Why are leaves important to you?

What do leaves do for a plant?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned more about the function of the leaf.

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Lesson 11 Three things plants need

Imagine a plant that does not live in the ground or float on water. Where could this plantbe living?

There is a plant called an orchid. It has purple, pink and orange flowers on it. This onelives in the tropical rain forest. It grows high up on a tree. Yes, I said lived ON a tree. Theroots of the orchid wind around the trunk of the tree. That would hold it steady give theplant support.

The roots are actually in the air. How does it get water and minerals? When it rains thewater drips down the bark of the tree along with minerals and the roots soak it up. Some of the orchids have roots that are flat and as long as you are tall. They wrap aroundthe trunk of the tree and look like a worm. The scientific name for it is “tapeworm leaf”.

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These roots are extraordinary. They not only collect water and minerals they are green. You know what that means! These roots can produce food for the plant. This orchid reallydoes not need leaves though it may have very small ones.

What makes the roots of some tropical rain forest orchids unusual?

Put it all together now: We depend on plants. They provide oxygen for us to breathe. Many are food for us. Some even provide us with clothes and shelter. Part of the plant’sability to survive is how well the parts work together. They need to produce food, absorbwater and minerals as well as breathe carbon dioxide. The three parts of a plant are roots,stem and leaves.

Now in your notebook write your response to these questions:

How do roots, stems and leaves help a plant survive? List the three things plantsneed to live. How do orchids live in the rain forest? Now you need to compareand contrast two or more different kinds of roots.

Also, look up the royal lily pad. What makes it unique? Write down interestingthings you find out about it.

Research the names of different types of orchids. Draw what they look like or copyphotos.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students focused on a unique plant of the tropical rain forest andresponded to review questions about plants.

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Lesson 11 Three things plants need

Name: ___________________________________________Date:_________________


What makes the roots of some tropical rain forest orchids unusual?

They grow on the trunk of a tree absorbing water as it runs down the bark of the tree.

How do roots, stems and leaves help a plant survive?

Roots absorb water for the plant. The stems give the plant support for the leaves to reachout to the sun. The leaves absorb sunlight and carbon dioxide to feed the plant.

List the three things plants need to live.

How do orchids live in the rain forest?

Orchids live high up in trees. Their roots grow around the trunk and absorb water andminerals that run down the tree trunk.

Compare and contrast two or more different kinds of roots.

Answers will vary.

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Look up the royal lily pad. What makes it unique? Write down interesting things you find

out about it.

The size of the royal lily pad makes it unique. The leaf can grow to be 4-6 feet across andsupport 100 pounds of weight, if evenly distributed.

Research the names of different types of orchids. Draw what they look like or copyphotos.

Answers will vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students focused on a unique plant of the tropical rain forest andresponded to review questions about plants.

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Lesson 12 Plants need....

Name: ____________________________________________Date:________________

You have studies about the parts of the plant and their individual functions. Now it is timeto experiment a little with sunlight and the leaf of a plant.

Take a growing plant from home Cover at least four leaves with aluminum foil so no light can get to it Place the plant on the windowsill where there is plenty of sunlight You will leave the plant like that for the rest of the lesson time.

While that experiment is setting consider the different climates of our world. We have thevery cold Arctic, the deserts in different countries and the rocky land.

What kinds of plants grow where you live? Are they like other plants in other parts of theworld? Why do you think they are or are not like other ones?

You just read about the sunlight, water and soil plants need to survive. In the dry desert itwould be difficult for a plant to survive because it is so hot and the soil is too sandy forroots to hold. In rocky areas it would be nearly impossible for plants to survive becausethere is very little soil…or we would think.

Plants sure would look different in different parts of the world. Like the orchid, growing inthe tropical rain forest would look strange in the northern part of the United States where itgets very cold in the winter.

Plants are living things and they are amazing. They can adapt to different environments. This is called adaptation. It does not happen quickly but over years plants have beenknown to adapt to difficult environments and survived.

Plants actually grow on rocks. How does that happen? There are tiny cracks between inthe rocks. Wind blows sand into the cracks. The plants put down very tiny roots andgrow!

In the dry, hot desert there are plants too. These plants put down long roots. Their rootsgrow deep and spread far from the plant. They even have a method to store water. Consider the cactus with its waxy covering and spongy stem; it is a survivor of the desert.These plants have to ward off weather conditions and lack of water to live. They adapt. That means change their natural features. Some plants grow over the top of other plantsto get sunlight. They have aerial roots because they above ground like the orchid we readabout.

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Lesson 12 Plants need....

Name: ____________________________________________Date:________________

The plants of the world are gorgeous. They add color to our surroundings because theycome in every color. Some are so small they can only be seen with a microscope.

Perhaps one day when you become a scientist, you will discover yet a new species ofplants.

Respond to the following questions. With your digital tools, circle the correct answer.

Plants can change to survive in their environment. True or False

The ability to change is called: Irrigation or Adaptation

Plants so not need water: True False

To get more sunlight, some plants: Grow bigger roots or Grow larger leaves

Plants that grow on rocks have: No roots or Tiny, thin roots

There are no differences in the climates of the world: True or False

Now that your lesson time is over you should go back to your plants. Remove only the cover of ONE leaf.

In your notebook, write down what you observe about that leaf.

Now leave the other three covered. Uncover them one day at a time and record how they look.

Write how what you saw that changed from day to day.

Conclude: How do light and darkness affect the growth of leaves?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students did an observation about how light affect leaves and readabout plant adaptation.

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Lesson 13 How does photosynthesis work?

Where does energy come from? Where do you get your energy? You are correct if youanswered from the foods you eat. Plants make their own food buy they need energy to gothrough that process. Where does the energy come from first? It comes from light,especially sunlight.

Light is a form of energy. Plantscapture the energy of light and trap itin the foods they make. When theyneed this energy to make food theyuse up what they have stored. Theword for the food making process is: photosynthesis.

The very word is Greek for “puttingtogether by light”. The process iscomplex. Take you leaf out and drawan outline of it on your plain paper ingreen. As you read there will bedirections for writing on this leaf.

The leaf is green because it haschlorophyll, which helps the plantmake food. Chlorophyll is found in theleaf in chloroplasts, which are tinychemical factories. Inside them thereis water and carbon dioxide thatcombines to make sugar and oxygen.

Write the words cells with chlorophyllon the leaf. Write sugar outside theleaf with arrows on the leaf. Write

carbon dioxide outside the leaf and draw arrows indicating it goes into the leaf. Write waterat the bottom of the leaf indicating it goes up into the plant; draw an arrow showing that.

This process does not happen with light energy. The sugars that the Sun’s energy helpsthe leaf to make go into the leaf’s veins and off to all parts of the plant.

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Write oxygen outside the leaf with an arrow leaving the leaf. Draw an arrow on the leafwith the word light on it. The plant processes oxygen, which goes into the air. Theanimals need oxygen so they breathe that in from the air and give back the carbon dioxidethe plant uses.

Finally the cells used the oxygen to break the sugar energy apart for the plant to use. Thisprocess is called respiration. This is the same process that animals use to release energy. Another visual way to think of this process is a huge circle. A start arrow would be sunlightand chlorophyll form sugars and oxygen. Next arrow would indicate that sugars are storedin green plants and oxygen is released.

Think about it: you eat and breathe. You breathe out carbon dioxide and use energy.Now think: How is photosynthesis different from respiration?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students looked at the process of photosynthesis in plants.

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Lesson 14 The beauty of autumn!

Can you guess how leaves change colors? If you have experienced this you may have noticed that all the leaves except for confer trees with needles change. It is like over night in September or October that the trees are adorned with yellow, orange, and red in place of their summer green.

Actually the yellow and orange was in the leaf in the summer. You could not see it because of all of the chlorophyll. So why do we see those colors in the fall? Temperatures begin to drop and the leaf stops producing its chlorophyll. It slowly breaks down and vanishes. Now you can see the yellow and orange. If you see the red it is where the climate is especially cool. Where the climate is warmer and the sky is cloudy you only see yellow and orange.

So where would you see a greater variety of colors on the trees in South Carolina or Vermont?

If you were doing an experiment to find out about the color of leaves you could do this. What changes in the fall of the year? The temperature changes. This information would be considered a variable in an experiment. Secondly days are shorter so there is less daylight. This would be another variable for your experiment.

Now you would guess about the causes of the change in colors to the leaves.

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This guess is calla hypothesis. It is often stated as: If..then… statement. You might write; If the plant does not get water, then it will not grow. To find out if this is true you would set up an experiment.

If our experiment had temperature and light as variables then there would have to be several different set-ups for the experiment.

Two plants: one with warm temperature and good light the other with no light but same temperature

Two plants: both with good light but one with cool temperature and one with warm

Two plants: One with good light and warm temperature the other with cool temperature and no light.

What stays the same? One plant in the pair always has correct temperature and light to grow. One in each pair varies each time: one time no light; one time light but cool temperature and the third time no light and cool temperature.

That is how you set up variables to do an experiment.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about how we see different colors of leaves in the fall and how to set up an experiment.

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Lesson 15 What parts of the plants do we eat?

What have you had to eat today? Are any of the foods plants? Which ones? There probably is not a part of a plant that you have not eaten at one time or another. Whether you know it or not, you have eaten roots, stems, leaves, seeds, fruits, flowers,and bark and sap.

Make a chart. Title your chart: Plant Parts and Their Foods

You will make list of foods that humans eat from each of these plant parts: roots, stem,leaf, fruit, seed, flower, bark and sap.

You may use a resource book or the internet as a resource. Categorize them under thepart of the plant.

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Lesson 15 What parts of the plants do we eat?

Name: _________________________________________________Date:____________

Complete the following:

Make a chart. Title your chart: Plant Parts and Their Foods

You will make list of foods that humans eat from each of these plant parts: roots, stem,leaf, fruit, seed, flower, bark and sap.

You may use a resource book or the internet as a resource. Categorize them under thepart of the plant.

Plant Parts and Their Foods

LEAF FRUIT SEED

___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________

FLOWER BARK SAP

___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________ ___________________ _______________________ ______________________

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Describe photosynthesis.

Describe the process of respiration in plants.

How would you design an experiment to determine if temperature or light had a greater

influence on why leaves change color in autumn.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students discovered that they eat many plants and most parts of theplant.

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Lesson 16 Review Quiz

Name: ____________________________________________Date: _______________

In this lesson you will take a quiz about the last few lessons you studied. Most of it is amultiple choice but there are also some critical thinking questions.

Word list: Cambium chlorophyll xylemCortex epidermis fungusPhotosynthesis root cap transpirationPhloem

1. What is the green chemical that allows plants to make its own food?

2. A mushroom is a Fungus.

3. A layer of tough cells protecting the root is called Root caps.

4. This separates xylem from phloem: Cambium

5. The outer layer of a root is the

6. Plants make their own food by this process: Photosynthesis

7. Water and minerals flow up a plant through the Xylem.

8. Through the root’s water and minerals pass to the xylem.

9. Foods flow down from the leaves through the Phloem.

10. Water goes out of the leaf; it is known as: Respiration

Circle the best answer

Which is a fungus? conifer moss

Plants give off: oxygen sugar

Green food factories are the: stoma chloroplasts

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The process plants go through when they use stored sugar for energy:

photosynthesis respiration

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Name: ____________________________________________Date: _______________

Answer these critical thinking questions with complete sentences or a paragraph.Write an explanation for how a fern plant could grow taller than moss.

You read about how you need to use a question to form a hypothesis for a scienceexperiment. How imagine you had to determine how much light a geranium plant needs inorder to survive. What would you do to set up an experiment to find this out?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students showed how well they understood the process of allowingplant to survive.

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Lesson 17 Life cycles

Most often we think of seeds being what we plant to grow a plant. Not all plants begin witha seed. Seedless plants have spores to reproduce and grow new plants. Spores are cellsthat can grow into new organisms. They are so tiny you may need a microscope to seethe spore. It is found inside a capsule called a spore capsule.

Some of the plants with spores are moss and liverworts. Ancient people thought theshape of the liverworts looked like a liver thus its name. They have large flat leaves. This classification of plants is divided into nonvascular and vascular plants. That meanssome of the spore producing plants have vascular tissue, which is like a long tube like cell. You remember what the back of the leaf looks like, veins going up into the leaf. That is thevascular system. The vascular plants use these cells to deliver water and food a longdistance. They are taller and thicker than the nonvascular plants. Moss and liverwortplants are short and delicate.

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Some of the vascular spore plants are ferns, horsetails, club mosses and spike mosses. The nonvascular moss plant does not have the long tube like structures. They cling todamp soil, sheltered rocks and the shade of a tree. Mosses and liverworts are tiny plantsthat grow to about two to five inches tall. Their leaves are made up of one to two cells.

Mosses do not have roots. They stay anchored to one place. They have hair-like fiberscalled rhizoids. Rhizoids can take water from their surroundings. The water just goesfrom one cell to another. Many mosses look like green, fuzzy pillows.

How do mosses and ferns get water?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learn about vascular and nonvascular spore plants.

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Lesson 18 The making of a new plant

Since moss and fern use spores to reproduce you would guess that would happen thesame way. You would be correct with some differences.

Both moss and ferns produce spores. This stage is called asexual reproduction. That isbecause the plant does not need but one type of cell or spore to reproduce. The mossspores grow into leafy moss plants that have male branches and female branches. Themale branches produce sperm or male sex cells. The female branches produce eggs orfemale sex cells. When a male sex cell meets a female sex cell, the two may jointogether. This is called fertilization.

On your plain paper draw a plant that has small leaves. On the top of the plantdraw something that looks like a small cup.

Draw an orange arrow and place small black spots on that arrow. Those willrepresent spores. Label the “cup” spore case and label the spores. Draw another small plant and label it a new moss plant.

Draw another arrow from that to another larger moss plant. Put small leaves on it. Label some leaves male branch and others female branch.

Draw two arrows from the larger plant moving in a circle. One arrow ends withanother something that looks like a “cup” with a green color. Put a round circle inthe bottom of the cup labeled egg with some black lines going into the cup. Fromthe other branch draw another green cup with short black lines going into the cup.

The final arrow going around goes from the two arrows to another “cup” drawn withgreen and the red circle in the bottom. Label this red circle fertilized egg. Nowdraw an arrow back to the first small cup you labeled spore case.

You have drawn the life cycle of a moss plant. The fertilized egg eventually becomes athin stalk with a spore case on top. When the spore case opens, the spores are released. Spores that land on damp ground may grow into new moss plants and the cycle beginsagain.

This process of going from sexual reproduction to asexual reproduction to sexualreproduction again is called alternation of generations.

Ferns also reproduce by alternation of generations. Leafy fern plants produce spores onthe underside of their fronds or leaves.

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Spores that land in shady, moist soil are most likely to grown. The spores grow into small,heart-shaped plants. These plants produce male and female sex cells.

If a male sex cell fertilizes a female sex cell, the fertilized egg starts to form a new plant. The new plant develops into a leafy fern plant. Spore cases on the ferns’ fronds producespores, and the cycle begins again.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learn about the life cycle of spore plants.

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Lesson 19How long have these plants lived?

nonvascular plantsmosses


Lesson 19How long have these plants lived?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

Lesson Wrap Up:

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Lesson 20 What do we know about seed plants?

Most of the plants we see everyday are seed plants. We see the grass, shrubs, trees and bushes. Thesevascular plants produce seeds. A seed contains anundeveloped plant and stored food for the new plant.

They all have roots, stems and leaves. Someproduce flowers and some do not. The group thathas flowers is called angiosperms and the flowerlessplant is called a gymnosperm.

The gymnosperms are the oldest seed plants. Theyinclude evergreen trees as pine, fir, cedar, juniper,yew, larch and spruce.

Gymnosperms appeared on Earth about 250 million years ago. The angiosperms appeared about one million years after that.

The fruits, vegetables, grains, and almost all of the nuts you eat are produced byangiosperms. You do not want to eat the nut of a pine tree. It is the seed of certain pinetrees.

The gymnosperms are divided into four divisions. They are the conifers, cycads, ginkgoesand gnetophytes. Their seeds are produced on the scales of female cones. The seedsare not surrounded by a fruit. The leaves of most gymnosperms look like needles orscales. Most gymnosperms are evergreens. Evergreens lose only a few leaves at a timeand constantly replace the leaves they have lost.

Some conifers, such as the larch, dawn redwood, and bald cypress, lose their leaves eachfall. Plants that do this are called deciduous.

Gymnosperms evolved on Earth during a cold and dry time. They can survive in cold, dryclimates. The needles of conifers have a very small surface area and are covered with athick cuticle. They lose less water than the wider leaves of flowering plants.

Interesting fact: The seed for the bristlecone pine sprouted about 5,000 years ago.

How are angiosperms and gymnosperms different?

Lesson Wrap Up: There are two divisions called angiosperms and gymnosperms.

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Lesson 21 Which kind of tree produces my fruit?

Just the thought of eatinggrass is not appealing is it? You read that theangiosperms plant hadflowers and seeds. Wheatbelongs to the angiospermfamily. It is a grass thatproduces one of the world’smost important food crops.

There are 235,000 differentkinds of angiosperms,which makes them thelargest division in the plantkingdom. Angiosperms aremost recent and bestadapted division in the plantkingdom.

Duckweed is the smallestflowering plant. The largestflowering plant is the gianteucalyptus tree. It can growto 330 feet in height and 66

feet in circumference.

Angiosperms grow all over the world. The saguaro cacti live in the hot, dry desert. Youknow the orchids live high in the air attached to trees in hot, damp rain forests. They evenlive in the Arctic Circle.

There is an angiosperm that has very little chlorophyll and thus must live depending onother living things. These kinds of plants we call parasites. The stinking corpse lily thatlives in Southeast Asia is a parasite. It produces one of the largest flowers. The flowercan be a meter across and as thick as you thumb and weight as much as a small dog.How can you tell an angiosperm from a gymnosperm? Angiosperms produce flowers;gymnosperms do not. The seeds of angiosperms are inside a fruit. Gymnosperms do notproduce fruits.

Lesson Wrap Up: Some plants have flowers and some do not.

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Lesson 23 How do you know there is a flower near by?

Do all flowers smell pleasant to you? Roses usually have a beautiful perfume aroma. For this reason many people love to have roses in their homes.

Do you think the aroma of the flower actually helps the environment and life of the rose plant?

These beautiful aromas attract insects. They help to pollinate the plant. Tiny grains of dust called pollen sticks to the insect. The pollen contains the male sex cells of the plant. As the insect moves the pollen rubs off on parts of the flower that hold the female sex cells. When the cells come to-gether a new plant will grow.

One plant has an awful-smelling odor. The jack-in-the-pulpit is one such plant. It attracts flies. Once the insect is inside the flower it discovers the plants sides are smooth and the insect cannot get out. The insect races around and keeps hitting the inside of the flower over and over. After about 24 hours the inside of the flower changes to wrinkles. Now the insect can get a hold and exit the flower. The work is done.

Answer these questions in your notebook. How are flowers important to a plant? What is the difference between monocots and dicots?

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Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Brocken Inaglory


Lesson 23 How do you know there is a flower nearby?

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Answer these questions.

How are flowers important to a plant?

What is the difference between monocots and dicots?

How are gymnosperms and angiosperms alike and different?

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Lesson 24 Fertilized flowers produce seeds

Every living organism has a way of producing more organisms. The reproduction of plantsdepends on certain parts of the flower functioning correctly.

Not all flowers are complete flowers. Complete flowers have: sepals, petals, stamens,and pistils. Incomplete flowers hare missing one or two of these parts. Some Flowers arecalled perfect flowers because they have both male and female parts. They have a pistilwhere the eggs are developed. They also have the stamen, which is the male part.

If you look very closely at an oaktree you may notice tiny greenflowers. When you take a flowerapart you are able to see all its parts.

If you unfold a flower or take thefront pedal off and look very closelyyou should see something in themiddle. It is the PISTIL. It isshaped similarly to a pin at thebowling alley. There are threenames to label this important part ofthe plant. The round part on thebottom is called the OVARY. At the

base of the pistil in the ovary are the egg cells. The stalk like part of the pistil is called theSTYLE. The top of the pistil is considered the STIGMA.

At the bottom of the pistil there is a part that looks like small leaves and are called theSEPALS. Of course, the parts of the flower outside of this are the PETALS.

Around the pistil are thread-like structures growing from under the pistil. They are tallerthan the stigma. They are called the FILAMENT. On the top of the filament areANTHERS. They hold the pollen and look like a small cotton ball full of powdery pollen.You may like to find some resources books and just look at the different types of flowers. You could open one up and look inside.

Copy all the names for the parts of the flower. Try to memorize them for yourself.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned the names for the parts of a flower.

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Lesson 25 Pollination/Fertilization

Seeds come in many sizes. The seed of a double-coconut tree can be half your weight. The smallest seed belongs to the orchid. You could put thousands of this type seed onone teaspoon. No matter the size of the seed, all seeds develop the same way.

The pollen grain must journey to the stigma. The pollen grain is the male sperm for theflower. This is called pollination. If the grain of pollen fertilizes the stigma of its own flowerit is called self-pollination. If the pollen travels to another plant it is called cross-pollination.What happens when the pollen lands on the stigma is a tube grows down the style andinto the flower’s ovary. There the sperm cell combines with or fertilizes the egg cell. A seed develops from a fertilized egg cell. This process of making a new plant is calledsexual reproduction.

On a plain paper draw a box and write in it: “Once the pollen has landed on the stickysigma of a pistil, a pollen tube starts to grow.” Draw a few pedals of a flower with the pistilvisible and the filament with the anther on it. Inside the ovary part draw an olive size andshape egg. On the top of the stigma put a piece of pollen grain.

Draw a box two with the words: “The pollen tube grows from the pollen grain down thestyle. It grows into the ovary until it reaches an egg cell.” Draw another flower showingthe grain of pollen moving down toward the egg cell.

Draw a box three with the words: “The sperm travels down the pollen tube and fertilizesthe egg cell.” Draw the flower again only this time the seed is in the olive shaped egg. Draw a last box and label the picture: Fertilization occurs when a sperm from a pollengrain travels down the style and combines with an egg in the ovary.

Can you retell the story of the journey for the grain of pollen?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students: Learned the process of the fertilization of flowers.

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Lesson 25 Pollination/Fertilization

Name: _______________________________________________Date: ______________

Draw a box and write in it “Once the pollen has landed on the sticky sigma of a pistil, apollen tube starts to grow.” Draw a few pedals of a flower with the pistil visible and thefilament with the anther on it. Inside the ovary part draw an olive size and shape egg. Onthe top of the stigma put a piece of pollen grain.

Draw a second box with the words: “The pollen tube grows from the pollen grain down thestyle. It grows into the ovary until it reaches an egg cell.” Draw another flower showingthe grain of pollen moving down toward the egg cell.

Draw a third box with the words: “The sperm travels down the pollen tube and fertilizesthe egg cell.” Draw the flower again only this time the seed is in the olive shaped egg. Draw a last box and label the picture: Fertilization occurs when a sperm from a pollengrain travels down the style and combines with an egg in the ovary.

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Can you retell the story of the journey for the grain of pollen?

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Lesson 26 What is in a seed?

Have you ever seen the inside of a seed? You can look inside a lima bean. It is fairlylarge and easy to handle. The seed should soak in water overnight. Carefully pull apartthe two halves of the lima bean. Examine the halves carefully. If you have a magnifyingglass, use it. Take your science notebook and draw what you see.

Which part do you think could be an embryo?

On your drawing label the seed coat and cotyledon where food is stored. Is the lima bean a dicot or a monocot? Explain how you know which is which. The seed is made up of three main parts: an embryo, which is an immature plant. Another part is the cotyledon where food is stored in the form of starch. The thirdpart is the seed coat that protects the seed.

For the seed to grow into a plant something’s must happen. First, the seed must movefrom the flower to a place where it can sprout. This is what is called seed dispersal.The second, the place must provide what is needed for a new plant to sprout. This iscalled germination. A warm temperature and water are the two things needed. Food isalready stored in the seed.

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Seeds are found long distances from the parent plant. How could that happen? The seed that land near its parent plant may not get enough sunlight because the biggerplant covers the light and warmth. The older plants may use the water and minerals thatthe seed needs to survive.

Seeds can be blown away in the wind. Dandelion fruits have feathery “parachutes” to aidin flying away. Some animals move seed stuck to their fur.

Animals eat fruit. A fruit is a mature ripened ovary of a plant. The animals digest the softparts of the fruits but not the hard seeds inside. As the animals move from place to place,they deposit the seeds in their waste.

Gymnosperms do not produce fruits. They disperse their seeds in other ways. The conesof the balsam fir tree shatter. Whey they do this, they release wing like seeds that ride onthe wind. Animals move cones from place to place. Heavy rains, floods, and streams candisperse them too.

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Lesson 26 What is in a seed?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_____________

What are the three parts of a seed?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students looked at seeds and find the parts of a seed.

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Lesson 27 How does a conifer live?

Evergreen trees are called conifers. They are part of the gymnospermsclassification. They are similar to theangiosperms but do have a differentlife cycle.

A pine tree belongs to a group ofgymnosperms called conifers. Pinesproduce male and female cones on amature tree. The scales that form thecones carry spore cases that producethe plant’s sperm and egg cells. Malecones produce pollen grains, whichcontain sperm cells.

Wind may blow the pollen grains fromthe male cone and it may land on a

female cone. The sperm cell will fertilize the egg cell.

This becomes a seed. In the winter the female pine cones falls from the tree. The seedsscatter on the ground. The wind or water may carry the seed far away. They end up onplaces where conditions are right for germination. The seed will sprout a new pine treeand start growing.

That is the life cycle of the conifer plant.

Some plants can be grown from pieces of the mother plant. It comes from the stem,leaves and roots. This is called vegetative propagation. It is also called asexualreproduction because it happens with sperm and egg cells joining. A strawberry plantsends out roots and another plant grows from it. Flowering plants produce almost all of the plants you eat. People eat flowers, fruits, seeds, leaves, stems, and roots. Floweringplants are also eaten by animals that we eat.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned the life cycle of the conifer plants.

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Lesson 27 How does a conifer live?

Name: ___________________________ Date: ________________________

Draw two branches of an evergreen tree. On one of the branches draw small browngrowths that look like Christmas tree lights. Label the male cones. From this tree draw anarrow to the second branch. Over the arrow draw small dots that will represent the pollen. On the second branch draw a pine cone that has its scales open. Label this cone femalecone and label in the scale ovules (ovary).

Now draw an arrow going up from those two branches draw another branch with a conepine seeds blowing out of it. These are bigger than the pollen. Draw another arrow fromthat to the ground and a small tree growing from it.

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Lesson 28 Review and enrichment

Name: _____________________________________________Date: _______________

In this lesson you will need to respond to a few questions to show you understood yourlast lessons. You may use your notebook to respond to these things. Write the namesand functions of the parts of a flower. Explain how seeds are produced. How are seedsdispersed?

Now there are stories about how the apple seeds got to the Western part of our country. They call this person Jonny Appleseed. Have you heard of him? The question is, was hea real person? Find the answer and write about the advantages and disadvantages ofbringing new plants into a region.

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Lesson 29 What are Tropisms?

The flash of a camera light can cause you to blink or close your eyes. Things in ourenvironment like heat, light and gravity are stimuli.

Plants respond to their environment too. They do so much more slowly than humans. Scientists have called this response tropism. Tropisms help a plant survive. When youplant a seed it will sprout. Why do you think the roots grow down into the ground?

If you thought of Earth’s gravity, you were correct. That is the stimulus that the plantresponds to and it is called gravitropism. Do you see the prefix part of that word isgravity?

It is the plant’s roots that respond and grown down. This is a positive response. The stemof the plant does not grown down but up so this is a negative response to gravity. This isgood because the stem needs to reach to the light and heat of the sunlight to survive. The plants response to light is called phototropism. The plants respond to the change inintensity and lack of light. If the light is coming from one direction the stem will grow in thatdirection only. This is a positive response to light.

If you were to examine the roots of a tree growing near a lake, you will find that the rootsgrow toward the water. What do you think this response is called? You were correct ifyou thought of hydro, which means water, is part of the word. It is called hydrotropism. This is a positive response.

Scientist studies plants to find out what causes them to respond to light, water and gravity. They did experiments with plants and found there was something called an auxin in plants. Auxin is a chemical in a plant. It is a substance that enables plants to grow and makeadaptations to where they are planted so they survive. It causes cells growth.

Now think about this and respond in your notebook: Give examples of tropisms and

how they affect the survival of a plant.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned there is a chemical in plants that help them use theirenvironment and adapt to their survival needs.

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Lesson 30 How Do Plants Survive?

You are learning about plants survive and adapt to their environments. One of the flowers that respond to sunlight that you could observe is the sunflower. This plant seems to know the time of day. In the morning it actually turns to the east. Through out the day it moves its flower to the west. It is a sight to see when these very tall beautiful flowers are swaying in the breeze and moving toward the sunlight. This would be which tropism?

When we want to investigate the life a tree we “read” the rings of its trunk. Typically, a tree grows one ring for each year of its life. If we want to know what kinds of adaptations the tree has made to make in its life we measure the size of the rings. A wide ring means the tree had adequate moisture during that year of growth. If the ring is narrow it indicates a drought year or poor conditions for the trees growth.

Plants survive in deserts, rain forests, and the Arctic cold. They do this because they can adapt to their environment. An adaptation helps an organism survive in it environment.

Desert plants collect and store water. It is stored in the center of the plant. The plants stomata only opens at night so little water is lost through transpiration. There are carniv-orous plants too. They eat insects. Plants like lettuce and spinach bloom in early spring. They are called long-day plants because when they bloom there is more daylight than night. Strawberries and soybeans are short-day plants because they bloom when there is more darkness than sunlight. These flowers response is called photoperiodism. That word when taken apart means light for a period of time.

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Plants have enemies too. There are things in the environment, that eat them up and destroy them. Each plant is competition with the other plants around them for water, light and minerals.

Nature has given plants a chemical that is part of their system. These help to keep other plants from growing too close to them. The chemicals may kill other plants and discourage insects from feeding on them.

The neem tree of Africa and Asia makes the most powerful insect-fighting plant chemical. This is chemical is so powerful that water mixed with one teaspoonful used as a spray would keep insects from feeding on it.

Plants respond to changes in their environment. They have to be able to adapt to changes in light, water, and temperature. They need these adaptations in order to survive. Other important adaptations help plants reproduce successfully and fight off enemies such as insect pests.

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Lesson 30 How Do Plants Survive?

Name:__________________________________ Date: _________________________

In your notebook, respond to the following questions.

What are tropisms? Give an example of one.

Tropisms are a plants response to their environment. Hydrotropism is the response the root has, making it grow toward water.

What helps plants grow toward the sun?

Phototropism is the plants response to grow toward the heat of the sun.

What do you think would happen if all plants bloomed at the same time?

Answers will vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Plants have many means of adapting to their environment.

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Lesson 31 How are animals alike or different?

Look very carefully at up to 25 different pictures of animals. Place the pictures into threeor four groups. You decide how and what groups you will classify the animals into. Write down why you classify the animals as you do. Which traits did you use most often ingrouping your pictures? Was that easy or difficult to accomplish?

Animals have several different traits such as shape, size, body parts, and color.

If we could look inside the wing of an eagle and a bat wing we would see something quiteinteresting. The bones in the wing of an eagle have a big bone, a hinge connecting twosmaller bones and another hinge or joint and one long bone and a small short bone. Nowinside the bat wing there is a long bone hinged to another long bone and then it separatesout into what looks like five fingers. So the eagle has one finger like bone and the bat hasfive. Hard to believe they are different while still being and functioning as wings. This is why scientist put organisms into a single system.

Lesson Wrap Up: Organisms are classified.

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Lesson 32 What do scientists use to classify organisms?

What do scientists see about animals that put them in one of two classifications? It is a wonder! A bat and cat do not seem to be in one classification. Both bats and catshave hair. They both feed their young milk. The bat and the eagle fly and have wings. But the bat and the eagle are different in that one has hair and one has feathers; one feedtheir young milk and the other does not.

Animals are divided into two large groups. One group is made up of animals that havebackbones. The members of this group are called vertebrates. The members of theother group do not have backbones. They are called invertebrates.

You can divide vertebrates and invertebrates into smaller groups. What animals go intowhich group? Now the scientists look for similar traits. They are listed into simplest to themost complex.

Examples of invertebrates are a sponge, sea anemone, marine flatworm, hookworm,earthworm, tree snail, grasshopper, lobster, spider and starfish. Research them to seewhat they look like.

A sponge is the simplest with a hollow tube like body. It has pores and cells but noorgans. It lives in the water.

Sea anemones have no heads or tails and live in water. They have tentacles where theymake and inject poisons.

Flatworms have heads and tails. They also live in the water.

Roundworms have a digestive system and a simple nervous system. They live inside ofplants and animals.

Earthworms have eyes, jaws or gills and specialized organs. They have a circulatory,digestive and nervous system.

Snails, clams and octopuses belong to the mollusks and have a shell. They may have theshell inside or outside. They have three main body parts. They have a foot, tissuecovering a mantle and a compartment holding internal organs. They breathe with gills andjaws. There is a circulatory system for moving blood.

Arthropods have a tough outer skeleton, jointed legs and a body made up of two, three ormore sections. There is more of this group on earth than any other kind of animal. Theyinclude insects, spiders, centipedes, millipedes, lobsters, and crabs.

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An echinoderm such as a starfish has a skeleton inside the body. They have spiny skinand tube-like feet with suction cups.

Lesson Wrap Up: As you read the list you could see how each group gets morecomplicated. One group is the invertebrate.

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Lesson 33 What animals are in the vertebrate groups?

After the groups are identified and you investigate them, think about where they live. The simplest fish, the lamprey do not have jaws or bones. The skeleton is made ofcartilage. The fish does not have a backbone but does have a tough nerve cord. Theylook like a worm and lives on other fish.

The reef sting rays are made of cartilage not bone. It runs down the back of a sting raymade of a chain. They have jaws and a pair of fins.

The bony fish actually has bones instead of cartilage. They have an air sac that allowsthem to hover at any depth of water.

The amphibians have four legs and skin that is not covered with scales. They live in thewater when young and then grown lungs as they move out of the water. Frogs, toads andsalamanders are in this class.

There is a reptile group. It is the first vertebrate to grow and develop out of water. Theybreathe with lungs. Some in this class are turtles, crocodiles and snakes.

Next are the birds. Not all of them can fly. They do have feathers.

Now the classification that you belong in: mammals. All mammals feed their young milk. They have hair. Most mammals have larger brains than other vertebrates. Whales are inthis classification.

Water is a big part of animal’s lives as you can see from these classes. Within theseclasses scientist further divide the animals of the world. What do you think they look at? How about bills on birds? If the bill is short and sharp the bird eats seeds while the longscope-like bill is to catch fish. How about the claws of the bird? Sharp-long talons wouldbe used to catch small prey. So each type of bird could be classified.

So as we observe our world we can identify different animals by the characteristics we seeand how and where the animals live. We can also decide which animals are more alikeand which are not alike enough to be in the same classification.

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Lesson 33 What animals are in the vertebrate groups?

Name: _______________________________________________Date:_____________

What would be three traits you could use to classify animals?

What is the main difference between an invertebrate and an invertebrate?

Extra: Try this one for extra credit.

There is an animal that swims underwater. It has duck-like bill and webbed feet. It

lays eggs like a bird but the shell of the eggs are like those of a reptile. It is called a

platypus. What class would this animal be in…fish, bird or reptile?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned more about the classification of animals withbackbones.

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Lesson 34 Life cycle

Not all animals look the same when they are young as they do when full grown adults. You probably have learned of this with a butterfly.

Take a piece of plain paper and draw these stages: The beautiful butterfly begins as a small egg. Draw a small white egg circle on agreen leaf. Label that egg.

Next draw a green leaf with a black and white caterpillar on it. Label this stagelarva.

Next draw a green leaf with a cocoon on it. Label this stage pupa.

Finally you can draw a beautiful butterfly with colorful wings.

This is a sample of a complete metamorphosis of an insect. The egg hatches into awormlike larva. It eats a lot and grows to become a pupa. Many body changes and thelarvae spin a protective cocoon. Finally, the adult winged insect hatches.

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An incomplete metamorphosis begins with an egg, growing to a nymph (much like a smalladult with no wings) and then grows to an adult. The grasshopper does this.

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Name: _____________________________ Date: _____________________________

Now, if you go to the water’s edge you will find changes happening. Take your plain paperand draw pictures of what you think these would look like.

Under water near some long weeds there are jelly-like deposits of eggs. They justlook like a black dot in the middle of clear jello. Label this picture eggs.

Next, draw a fairly long, but small fish, with big eyes and two tiny buds growingwhere front legs may grown. Label this your tadpole with gills.

Next draw a tadpole with four tiny legs but still a long tail. Label this tadpole withlimbs.

Next draw a frog with a fatter body but still a very small tail and underwater. Labelthis young frog.

Finally, draw a frog out of the water. Label this adult frog with lungs.

This is an amphibian.

What are the stages of a complete metamorphosis?

Learn the names of each stage of growth.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students followed the changes some animals.

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Name: _____________________________________________Date:________________

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Lesson 35 How animals adapt?

Tiny little insects need to survive. How do they do that? Certain traits help them in theirenvironment. These traits are called adaptations.

Animals need to keep from being eaten by their predator or an animal that may eat them. You have learned to avoid insects like a yellow jack because you have learned it may stingyou. Animals have learned to avoid other animals too.

One technique insects have been able to do is look like something else. They appearunpleasant or mimicry. A syrphid fly is harmless but can mimic a stinging wasp and thussurvive.

The Monarch butterfly and the Viceroy butterfly resemble each other. Birds havediscovered not to take a big bite out of a dead butterfly right away because the Monarchdoes not taste good; it tastes awful!

The thornbug looks just like a thorn on a bush. It predators stays away and the thornbugis safe.

Another thing an animal does is try to become invisible. They just make themselvesappear like their surroundings. The animal moves very slowly and looking like itssurroundings is called camouflage. This helps them survive from their predators. Two things that provide camouflage is color and shape. For instance a bird may miss aleaf butterfly because its wings look like the leaves. Birds also like to eat moths. Light-colored moths are disappearing because the birds can see them. The dark-colored mothsare surviving. This is an example of how camouflage is called protective coloration. Thecolor of the dark moth on dark bark on a tree protected them from predators.

How does camouflage help an animal survive?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about what allows some animals to protectthemselves from predators.

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Lesson 36 Who is my mother?

How do birds know how to build a nest? How do they know where and what kind of nest isneeded for them? The answer is they do it automatically. They do not have to see theirparents do it.

This is a sign of inheritance. The birds inherit the ability and knowledge of how to build anest. It is passed down from one generation to the next. An inherited behavior is one thatis not learned. This is called instinct. The passing of inherited traits from parents tooffspring is called heredity.

What else is inherited? What the offspring looks like. Like a swan does not fit in with afamily of ducks. While they are birds the shape of the feet and beak is inherited. Thecolor of its feathers is inherited. It is easy to see.

Physical traits are inherited like an elephant is naturally larger than a mouse. However,where the animal lives may determine how healthy they are and how big they grown.Some animals have very similar characteristics but are different. Think about a horse,mule and donkey. Some parents are different from each other such as a horse anddonkey. They produce a hybrid offspring. The mule can do work that neither the horsenor mule can do. Mules can carry heavy loads over rugged country. They do not slip aseasily as horses. Mules have more endurance than a donkey.

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Sometimes the parents are bred to produce an offspring called a crossbreed. These offspring have specific characteristics that make something better than the parent insome way. When they crossbreed corn they produce a corn that is resist to disease,produce more food on the same area of land and are more nutritious.

A tree once was natural to an Oriental environment. It was found growing in London. Itdid not survive because the weather was too cold. Years later the same tree was crossbred with another tree that would survive in the cold weather and now the new crossbredtree grows all over London.

Diversity is important in the animal world too. Diversity refers to a group of the same kindof animal in which there are lots of animals with different traits. A group of mutts is madeup of individual dogs with very different traits. What happens with a mutt? Mutts can bevery healthy. Some purebred dogs are known to have breathing problems or hipproblems.

How is a mule an example of a hybrid animal?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students realize that characteristics are inherited from the parents. Some species are made better by producing hybrid or crossbreeding.

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Lesson 37Review your lessons

Name: ___________________________________________Date:_________________


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Lesson 38 What do living things need to survive?

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Try two environments:

Lesson Wrap Up:

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Lesson 39 What is an Ecosystem?

What or whom do you interact with every day? Living and nonliving things interact in anygiven ecosystem. An ecosystem is the living and nonliving things in one area. Ecology isthe study of these systems.

How large these areas are may vary considerably. One system may be part of the ocean. Another may be a pond. Saltwater systems take up more area than fresh water. Ecosystems may cover a large part of a continent like a desert in Africa or the rain forest of Brazil. What matters is all of these systems have the same parts.

The nonliving parts are called the abiotic factors. What would these be? Right, it wouldbe the rocks, sand, gravel as well as minerals, sunlight, air, climate and water. These arethings that living things need to survive. All living things or organisms need water. Livingthings need minerals like nitrogen, iron and calcium. They are dependent on nonlivingthings to provide them for survival.

Animals need oxygen to produce energy. Plants and algae need carbon dioxide. Theenvironment must have the right correct temperature too.

The correct abiotic factors help make it possible for organisms in an ecosystem to survive. The living parts are animals, plants, fungi, protists and bacteria. Mushrooms and moldsare examples of fungi.

These organisms make up the biotic factors or living pars of an ecosystem. Plants andalgae are called producers. They produce oxygen and food that animals need. Animalsare consumers. Animals consume, or eat, plants or animals. Animals also give off carbondioxide that plants need to make food.

What do the fungi and bacteria contribute? They are a very important part of anyecosystem. Fungi and bacteria are decomposers. They decompose, or break down, deadplants and animals into useful things like minerals that enrich soil. Plants need these inorder to grow. Each of these kinds of organisms helps the others to survive.

How are these happening in your home-made environments? Keep watching.What are five abiotic and five biotic factors in an ecosystem?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learn that both living and nonliving organisms are needed ina healthy environment or ecosystem.

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Lesson 40 Prairies

Long ago there was a large prairie area in North America. Now there is a prairie areacalled the Blackland Prairie in Texas. It is called the black-land because of the rich blacksoil the early settlers found there. Native Americans once hunted the buffalo on this land. It is now farmland and ranches.

Originally the land had buffalo and allkinds of plants and animals. Therewere at least 50 different kinds of talland short grasses for plant-eatinganimals. There were many kinds ofwildflowers. There were purpleconeflowers, bluebells, and yellowsunflowers. There were oak, hickory,elm or cedar trees along nearbystreams.

Cattle and crops provide our foodtoday. Ranchers and farmers grazecattle and plant crops such as corn andwheat on the Blacklands.

Animals that live on the prairie are thespotted chorus frog, rattlesnakes andlizards. Birds like pipits, longspurs andhorned larks as well as 300 other kindsof birds, still live on the BlacklandPrairie.

Raccoons, opossums, coyotes, white-tailed deer, and striped skunks live on theblacklands. Cotton rats, white-footed mice, eastern cottontails, red bats, and bobcats livethere, too.

Mountain lions, gray wolves, black bears, and jaguars used to come in search of prey. When people came and built towns, cities, and farms, the buffalo left. The animals thatfed on the buffalo left too. Texas was cleared for development.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about the prairie of North America.

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Lesson 41 The organization of living things

Many different organismslive in an ecosystem. Themembers are differentspecies. All the organismsof a species living in thesame area make up apopulation. So theBlackland Prairie had apopulation of animals likethe armadillos andbadgers. It has littlebluestem grass and Indiangrass. It even has pondalgae and soil bacteria.

Scientists studypopulations to learn howthey interact. Theyinvestigate the activities. Which animals eat plants? Which insects eat crops? They are interested in howbacteria and fungi makethe soil fertile.

Scientists have to studythe interactions of all thepopulations in the area. Allthe populations living in anarea make up acommunity.

Then there is the information the scientists get when they look for where the animals live. This is called their habitat. In the ecosystem each organism has a role to play. This iscalled their niche.

The niche includes the food they eat and what eats it. It includes the kind of environmentthe species needs to live in. It even includes whether the species is active by day or night.Each population is different. Why would that be true? Because, if we have the sameanimals, it would eat the same things. Something would not survive. They would have to

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live in the same space and reproduce in the same ways. They would have to grow underthe same temperature, moisture, and light conditions, get the same diseases, and lookand behave exactly alike. They would have to identical. No two populations are identicalso no two populations have the same niche.

Scientists study the habitats and niches of organisms in a community. They do this to seeif the community is healthy or in trouble.

How are your two ecosystems doing? Do you see any changes? What is the differencebetween a niche and a habitat?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about populations.

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Lesson 42 What if a habitat changes?

Name: _________________________________________________Date:____________

The world is a place of changes. One day the weather may be dry and cold. The next dayit may be wet and warm. Heavy rains may drench the land one spring and summer. Thenext year’s spring and summer may have cloudless skies and day after day. This makeshabitats change. An ecosystem may be perfect for the survival of some organisms at onetime and not the next. How do populations survive difficult times?

The Eastern spadefoot toad has learned to adapt. It usually lives in water. When therewas a drought time in the Blacklands its hind legs grew into that looks like a spade. It digsinto the ground and covers itself with soil. This toad can absorb water through its skin. There were bald eagles on the Blackland Prairies of Texas. Then they disappeared. Insecticides were used for a sixteen-year period when the eagles were disappearing. Theinsecticide was found in the eagle’s eggs.

Label note cards with names of organisms that live in an ecosystem.

Grasshopper: food prairie plants Meadowlark: food crickets, grasshoppers Ground Squirrel: food prairie plants Bullsnake: food mice, rabbits, ground squirrels, birds and eggs Red-Tailed Hawk: food ground squirrels, mice, rabbits, snakes, lizards, small birdsPrairie Plants: food made from water, carbon dioxide, and sunlight Coyote: food rabbits, ground squirrels, meadow mice, other rodents

On the top of the paper would be Sunlight.

Place the plant cards on the paper, and link each to the sunlight with tape andstring. Link each plant-eating animal to a plant card, Link each meat-eating animal to its food source.

Only two animals can be attached to a food source.

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Record the links you have made.

NOW fire destroys half the plants. Remove four plant cards. Rearrange the animal cards. Remove animal cards if more than two animals like to any one food source. Record thechanges you have made.

What has happened to the plant eaters as a result of the fire? What has happened to theanimal eaters? If plants or prey become scarce, their predators may move to a new area. What will happen to the ecosystem the predators move into?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students thought about the affects when an ecosystem is disturbed.

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Lesson 43 The Food Chain

Are small changes in a population important? Yes, every change in one population canaffect several other populations in the same ecosystem. Energy is needed for apopulation to survive. What is the source of that energy? The sun is the energy used ineach ecosystem.

You feel the energy as warmth to your skin. The meadow mouse and the red-tailed hawkfeel it too. Neither of these animals can usethis energy directly. But they need it tomove, breathe and keep their hearts beating.

The energy of the Sun is stored in food. Theenergy in food is passed from one organismto another in a food chain. A food chain isthe path energy takes from producers toconsumers to decomposers.

Plants capture the sun’s energy throughphotosynthesis. This energy is stored asfoods, or sugars, the plant makes itself. Plants are producer in the food chain.

A grasshopper may feed on the plant anduses some of the energy from that food. Some is stored in its body. The lizard mayeat the grasshopper. The hawk may eat thelizard. The hawk is the top of the prairieecosystem. The hawk eats snakes, mice,

lizards, rabbits and other birds.

When plants and animals die they become food for small organisms like crickets, wormsand ants. They are even a food source for microscopic organisms like bacteria. On your plain paper draw a picture of the food chain as described in your lesson. Titleyour paper: A food chain moves the Sun’s energy from producers to consumers. Yourbeginning is the sun and your end is decomposers: soil bacteria.

Lesson Wrap Up: Followed the food chain.

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Lesson 44 What is a food web?

How is a food chain different than a food web? You are correct if you guessed that a foodchain only shows how energy passes from one organism to another. In the food web youlook at how one organism relates to another in a community. It shows how populationsmust compete for food.

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The first thing is that a living organism must produce something. So the sun’s energyhelps the plants to produce food. In oceans the main producers are algae.

Next we have the consumer. Consumers can be grouped according to what type of foodthey eat. Humans are general classified as omnivores since they eat both meat andplants. The bear is considered an omnivore because it eats meats like salmon and plants. Some people choose not to eat meat so technically would be considered herbivores. Thebear is considered an omnivore because it eats meats like salmon and plants. Earth’sland and water are full of herbivores.

Herbivores are, in turn eaten by carnivores. Carnivores are animals that eat otheranimals. Cats, dogs, wolves and fox are carnivores. They have sharp-toothed animals. In the ocean the carnivore to be frightened of is the great white shark. Other sea animalseat meat too.

Living things that hunt other living things are considered predators. The living things theyhunt are prey. The relationship between these two, are the key to the food web and foodchain.

There are living things that do not hunt for their food. They are scavengers and they finddead animals and eat the remains. There are scavengers on the bottom of the ocean too. The hagfish swims along the bottom looking for dying fish.

Every living thing eventually dies. It ends with the decomposers such as worms, insects,bacteria and fungi. These organisms have the job of breaking down dead matter intosubstances that can be used by producers. Some of the matter is absorbed by thedecomposer, and the rest returns to the soil.

What are the parts of a food web?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read the names of the groups that are part of the communityof living organisms and how they interact to survive.

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Lesson 45 Competition is on!

What could affect the healthy life of some living organism? One of those things would benatural disaster. If the rain forest does not get enough rain some things will not survive.Another upset to a community of living organisms is the introduction into the communitythat also eats what another predator depends on. That happened in Florida when ananole arrived from the island of Cuba. It was bigger than the green anoles that oncepopulated Florida.

It is unknown how this anole made the trip of 90 miles. Soon after its arrival the smallergreen anole just seemed to disappear. Did it disappear? No actually scientists foundthem living in a new habitat where it did not have to compete with the Cuban anole forfood.

Food webs show that animals compete for food. In order to survive, an organism mustadapt to competition. Sometimes it needs to change its habitat.

What happens when a farmer uses insecticides to kill pests? The insecticides may alsokill harmless ants. Now if the ants disappear then the birds and lizards that depend on

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them for food will have to find another food. Texas horned lizards eat ants but they alsoeat grasshoppers.

However, if there are less grasshoppers to eat, then the food chain changes. A change inthe population affects more than just a food chain. It affects all of the organisms in a foodweb.

Food chains and food webs help scientists predict how communities will be affected bychange.

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Lesson 45 Competition is on!

Name: ___________________________________ Date: _______________________

Think about the food web. Write how a change in the food web can affect otherpopulations?

Lesson Wrap Up: The population of a food web changes so all other organisms survivalis affected.

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Lesson 46What is the pyramid for the food chain?

Energy Pyramid for a Land Food ChainEnergy Pyramid for an Ocean Food Chain


Lesson 46What is the pyramid for the food chain?

Name: ___________________________________________Date: _________________

Lesson Wrap Up:

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Lesson 47 Are you affected by the food chain?

Name: _______________________________________________Date:______________

Scientists have found that a rapid increase in algae can cause a Red Tide. It can turnhundreds of square miles of ocean red. Most of it is harmless however some producepoisons.

If a food chain, food web, or energy pyramid changes, the results may affect humans. If afarm does not have enough insect predators, the insects may increase and damage thecrops. Humans influence changes, also. It is important to watch how human actionsaffect the populations of an ecosystem.

Write the answers to these questions in your notebook.

What is the original source of energy in an ecosystem? The sun.

What is the relationship between a food chain and a food web? A food chain showshow energy passes from one organism to another. In the food web you look at howone organism relates to another in a community.

Is it possible to have a food chain that has only a producer and a decomposer? Why or why not? No. There needs to be a predator or a scavenger. With havingonly a producer and decomposer there would be no balance. There would be anover abundance of producers.

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Write about a food chain that includes a meat that you eat. Include yourself as the finalconsumer.

Answers will vary.

Research why there are fewer coyotes than mice in a prairie ecosystem.

Answers will vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Food chain, food webs and energy pyramids affect humans.

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Lesson 48 Healthy you; you the consumer!

What kind of foods do you eat most often? What is your favorite? Do you know what partof the Food Pyramid they come from?

Think about it: What affects your food choices? What foods did you realize is advertisedoften on television? Who is the commercial audience meant to affect?

Have you ever looked for a toy or treasure in a cereal box? Advertisers often targetchildren. They want you to ask for their product when your parents go shopping. The food industry is a billion dollar industry. Advertising is done on television, magazinesand newspapers. It even happens on the Internet. They offer coupons, games and othergimmicks to get the consumer to buy their product.

The shopper is part of the food web. We are consumers. Unless a family produces itsown food, we buy our food. The choices are often based on what is found in thesupermarket. How do we make our choices?

We often choose food that looks tastes and smells good to us. Food advertisingencourages people to choose one product over another. They may have a colorful box oroffers of discounts or coupons.

As a result Americans eat more food per person than they did 20 years ago. Many peopleare unhealthy because of over eating.

What can you use to make healthy choices in food? You and your family could considerthe U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Guide Pyramid. It shows the kinds andamounts of food recommended for our health.

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Lesson 48 Healthy you; you the consumer!

Name: _____________________________________________Date:_______________

Draw the food pyramid. Answer shall follow the directives below.

Draw a large pyramid. Label your pyramid Food Pyramid. Make it the same as theother two you made except divide levels two and three in half. You will end up withsix sections.

One the large bottom level, draw or cut pictures out of rice, bread, cereal andspaghetti. This represents the grains in your diet.

One level two draw or cut pictures of fruits on one side and on the other side putvegetables.

One level three draw or cut pictures of cheese, milk, yogurt on one side and fish,meat on the other.

The top level would be nuts, which represents oils, fats and sweets.

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According to your pyramid, which food group should you eat the most servings per day: bread, cereal, rice, and pasta; vegetables; fruits; fat, oils and sweets?

Next time you reach for a snack and have the choice of cereal or an apple and you havehad no fruit that day; consider eating the apple.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students looked at the foods that should be eaten for their health.

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Lesson 49 How does water change forms?

Have you ever heard the word “recycle”? Perhaps you have some type of recycling ofpaper products in your community. Nature has a way of recycling water.

Water is not lost when it rains. Heat from the Sun absorbs the water of the oceans, seas,lakes, streams, ponds and even puddles. This heat makes the water evaporate and gointo the air. Evaporation is the process in which a liquid changes into a gas.

As the water vapor, or water in its gas state, rises higher and higher into the atmosphere, itcools. When cooled enough, water vapor condenses into tiny water droplets. Condensation is the process in which a gas changes into a liquid.

A cloud is formed from the water droplets. When the air is too heavy to hold the waterdroplets, it rains. The precipitation of water comes in the form of rain, sleet, snow or haildepending on the temperature of our atmosphere at the time.

The precipitation is absorbed by the Earth and is stored as groundwater. However, someof the water is part of our surface water. This water becomes runoff. It is collected instreams, lakes or rivers. It finds its way back into the oceans. Here it is absorbed into theatmosphere again. The water cycle is the continuous movement of water between Earth’ssurface and the air, changing from liquid to gas to liquid.

Draw a picture of a mountain from which flows into a river down into a pond. Draw groundwith trees and grass. In the field there could be a deer. In the pond there could be fishand perhaps even a seal. There could be a gull flying over the pond. Draw a few cloudsabove the mountain and sunshine near the trees and pond. Near the clouds on the topof the paper draw a box in which you write: Condensation: As moist air rises, it cools. Water vapor condenses into tiny water droplets forming a cloud. Draw an arrow from theclouds to the earth.

Just below the mountain draw a box with these words: Precipitation: Water droplets fall toEarth’s surface in the form of rain, sleet, snow, or hail.

Draw red arrows along the stream from the mountain down to the pond.

Draw a box on the earth section with the words: Plants are also part of the water cycle asthey remove water from the soil. Some water returns to the atmosphere through theplant’s leaves.

Draw a box over the earth close to the pond with the words: Collection: Some of thewater flows into streams, lakes and rivers while some soaks into the ground.

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Lesson 49 How does water change forms?

Name: _______________________________________________Date:_____________

Draw a picture of a mountain from which flows into a river down into a pond. Draw groundwith trees and grass. In the field there could be a deer. In the pond there could be fishand perhaps even a seal. There could be a gull flying over the pond. Draw a few cloudsabove the mountain and sunshine near the trees and pond. Near the clouds on the topof the paper draw a box in which you write: Condensation: As moist air rises, it cools. Water vapor condenses into tiny water droplets forming a cloud. Draw an arrow from theclouds to the earth.

Just below the mountain draw a box with these words: Precipitation: Water droplets fall toEarth’s surface in the form of rain, sleet, snow, or hail.

Draw red arrows along the stream from the mountain down to the pond.

Draw a box on the earth section with the words: Plants are also part of the water cycle asthey remove water from the soil. Some water returns to the atmosphere through theplant’s leaves.

Draw a box over the earth close to the pond with the words: Collection: Some of thewater flows into streams, lakes and rivers while some soaks into the ground.

Answers will depict the directives above.

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Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned the words used to explain the water cycle.

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Lesson 50 How are trees recycled?

Do all living organisms recycle? The recycling of matter is continuous. When they diethey give back something to the ecosystem they are part of.

How about a dead tree? When a tree is dead it is being turned into substances otherorganisms need to survive. Some of these are other trees. The dead tree is providingelements for living trees. How does this happen?

The old, fallen tree is made of wood, bark, and other dead tissues. The tissues hold allsorts of complex chemical substances. These chemicals need to be broken down. The decomposers are organisms that recycle matter from dead organisms. Worms,crickets, cockroaches, bacteria, and fungi are decomposers. These decomposers canbreak down dead wood and other dead plant parts into carbon dioxide and ammonia. Allliving plants need carbon dioxide in order to make sugars. Ammonia is a simplesubstance that contains the element nitrogen. Nitrogen is extremely important for plants. No plant can live or grow without nitrogen. All organisms need nitrogen in order to makeproteins.

Nitrogen is a chemical found in plant fertilizers. Fertilizers are substances used to addminerals to the soil. There are natural fertilizers. These are decaying plants and animalsand animal wastes. Others are made in factories. Both contain nitrogen.

Some people recycle plant material by composting. Gardeners use compost to make soilmore fertile. A good mixture for compost is three parts dry leaves and plant material, onepart fresh, grass clippings, and one part food scraps. Earthworms, insects, fungi andbacteria break down the leaves, grass, and food scraps into compost. The compostcontains nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium, which enrich the soil.

Nitrogen and carbon have their own cycles in nature too. Earth is a closed system. Withthe exception of energy, almost nothing gets out or gets in. It is recycled.

How do decomposers recycle nutrients?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read about decomposers and realize all thing recycle.

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Lesson 51 What is the carbon and nitrogen cycle?

If you have ever let a marshmallow burn on a stick, or a piece of toast burn, you haveproduced carbon. It is a very important element. All living things have carbon. It is foundin the air as carbon dioxide and used by plants. It is found in fuel to chairs to nonstickpans. A continuous transfer of carbon between the atmosphere and living things recyclesit.

Carbon enters the air when plants and animals decay. It enters the air when animalsbreathe out. It enters the air when fossil fuels such as coal, oil, gasoline and natural gasare burned.

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During photosynthesis plants use the carbon from carbon dioxide to make sugars,starches, and proteins. They also give off oxygen, which is used by animals. When living things die, the carbon in them goes into the air and ground. Some of it isturned into carbon dioxide by decomposers. Some is stored as fossil fuels. This is whathappened to the carbon in certain organisms that died millions of years ago. Animals eat plant sugars, starches, proteins, and other substances. The animals use thecarbon in these foods to make their own body chemicals.

Why do we need nitrogen? When you eat meat, fish, cereal or vegetables you are takingin the nutrients that your body needs to make proteins. Proteins are a part of yourmuscles and many cell structures.

The way nitrogen moves between the air, soil, plants and animals is called the nitrogencycle.

Some soil bacteria turn nitrates back into nitrogen gas.

Plants absorb nitrates dissolved in water through their roots. The nitrogen is then used bythe plant to make proteins.

Bacteria can use nitrogen from the air to make nitrogen-containing substances callednitrites. Other bacteria can turn nitrites into nitrates…another form of nitrogen-containingsubstances.

Animals eat plant proteins, or they eat other animals that eat plant proteins. Animalwastes contain nitrogen compounds.

When plants die, decomposers in the soil break down the plant proteins. One product isthe nitrogen-containing substance ammonia. Soil bacteria change ammonia into nitrites.Some bacteria that grow on pea and bean roots give those plants the nitrogen they need. The bacteria turn nitrogen gas in the air to nitrogen-containing substances the plants canuse to make their proteins.

Finally, the air is made up of about 78 percent nitrogen gas.

Lesson Wrap Up: Carbon and Nitrogen are important part of the living organismssurvival. Each has a cycle to keep them in our soil and air.

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Lesson 52 Why should we recycle?

Why is it important to recycle? Have you ever seen a product made from recycledmaterial? Often paper products are recycled. Plastic can be made into new products too.What do you consider garbage? Consider how nature takes care of things. If we lookthrough our garbage perhaps we will find many things that could be recycled. Check thebottom of your bottles and packaging. There may be a recycle code on the bottom to letyou know if it can be collected and be remade into something else.

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Lesson 52 Why should we recycle?

Name: ________________________________ Date: __________________________

There are many renewable resources. Trees can be made into paper. Paper can berecycled and thus we can save some trees and the homes of many animals.

Some things cannot be recycled and those things took millions of years to produce. Thatwould be oil and metals.

Sunlight is an inexhaustible resource because it has the potential of lasting for millions ofyears.

Think when you use something whether it could be recycled.

Think and write about the following:

By what process does water move from oceans, lakes, rivers, and streams into theair? Evaporation. Heat from the Sun absorbs the water of the oceans, seas, lakes, streams, ponds and even puddles. This heat makes the water evaporate andgo into the air.

Describe three ways that carbon dioxide gets into the air. Carbon enters the airwhen plants and animals decay. It enters the air when animals breathe out. It entersthe air when fossil fuels such as coal, oil, gasoline and natural gas are burned.

Name two substances that contain nitrogen. Answers will vary but may be two ofthe following: Air, soil, plants and animals.

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What organisms turn a dead tree into substances that can be used by living trees?

Decomposers

Lesson Wrap Up: Recycling by people will help our ecosystem. Nature has a method torecycle nitrogen and carbon.

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Lesson 53 Rain Forest of the Sea and a Review

Like a rain forest where a huge number of different plants and animals live in oneenvironment, this also happens in our warm seas. As many as one-quarter of the oceans’animals make their homes in the reefs of our oceans. These coral reefs take a long timeto grow; they can take thousands of years to grow. They are found in the shallow water.

They are animals. They are built of tiny polyps and live together in colonies. As theirpolyps grow they form hard skeletons. Special algae live inside the coral polyps. Thealgae provide food for the coral. The algae need sunlight to grow thus the coral is inshallow water.

The coral appears like a garden in the sea with its beautiful colors of orange, yellow,purple and green. The algae and the sea animals create the different colors for the coral. The coral reef is so important because it provides shelter for ocean plants and animalsincluding hundreds of fish.

Because the coral reef is so beautiful it is endangered as humans try to climb on them andsee this water-garden. The reef is very fragile and breaks easily. Pollution is also a threatto its growth. Many countries are trying to protect and save our coral reefs for the healthof our water life.

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Lesson 53 Rain Forest of the Sea and a Review

Name: _______________________________ Date: ___________________________

Use these words to complete these sentences.

CommunityEvaporationNichePopulationPredator

Abiotic factorEcologyFood chainOmnivorePrecipitation

Complete the following statements by filling in the answer or circling the correct answer.

1. We can trace our energy as it moves in a community with a/an food chain .

2. Evaporation is a process in which a liquid becomes a gas.

3. A (n) community includes all the members of a single species in a certain place.

4. A (n) predator is a consumer that hunts for its food.

5. A consumer that eats both plants and animals is called a (n) omnivore .

6. All populations have a unique niche in their habitat.

7. The study of how living and nonliving things interact in the same place is called

ecology .

8. Water is an example of a (n) .

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9. Elm, corn, and armadillos are part of the population of the prairie ecosystem.

10. Precipitation may include sleet and snow.

11. Which of these things is not an abiotic factor in an ecosystem? Water, minerals,

bacteria or soil (circle the best answer)

12. A vulture is an example of a: predator, scavenger, carnivore, all of the above

13. Plants absorb nitrogen from: soil, atmosphere, sun or insects

14. In the carbon cycle, carbon is transferred between ________________ and living

things: the ocean, the atmosphere, bacteria or minerals

What is the relationship between herbivores and carnivores?

Animals eat plant proteins, or they eat other animals that eat plant proteins. Animal wastes contain nitrogen compounds.

Write a paragraph about whether it is important to recycle the waste you produce.

Answers will vary.

Lesson Wrap up: Reviewed about the cycle of the life of plants and animals.

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Lesson 54 How much room is there on the Earth for all the

communities of life? What do living things depend on in their environment? Certain factors control the survival of living things. What do you think these things could be?

Think about dry wind howling across a prairie; hot sun baking the ground; no rain for days: plant-eating insects go hungry. The color of the mouse’s fur helps it blend into the dusty soil. However, when the mouse moves the hawks eye sees and in a flash grabs the mouse.

How is the size of populations in nature limited? Anything that controls the growth or survival of a population is called a limiting factor.

Nonliving factors that affect the environment would be the sunlight, wind, water and temperature. Living factors that affect the environment are grasses, insects, deer mice, and hawks.

You learned that there are communities of living things in certain environments. There is a food chain that keeps things in balance. The number of predators in an ecosystem affects the number of prey. The number of prey in an ecosystem can also determine how many predators the system can support.

There is competition between the communities of different living organisms for the natural resources such as water and sunlight. Overcrowding can in a population can cause a problem with the quality or ability to survive. They will have to compete with one another for food, water and shelter. Some will die.

There are plants on almost every spot of the earth. Consider the desert plants where there is very little rain. There are tiny plants growing in the icy northland where it is icy cold. Plants even grow on the floor of the rain forest where there is very little sunlight. Characteristics that help an organism survive in there environments is called adaptations. These are inherited traits not learned behaviors.

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Focus on the life of a plant in the desert; how would it survive in a place with less rain than two inches in a year? One such plant is the barrel cactus which lives in the Sonoran Desert.

This plant has roots that reach only three inches down into the dry soil. These roots absorb the rain quickly. When there is a long dry time, the ends of the roots drop off the plant. This helps the plant preserve the water it has stored.

The stem of the barrel cactus is folded and covered with needle-sharp spines. The stem is where the water is stored. The folds keep the plant from loosing water. Small animals and birds that would like to drink from the stem of the barrel cactus are kept away by the sharp spines.

Lesson wrap up: Students read about how animals and plants adapt and what are limit-ing factors in our environments.

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Lesson 55 How do some animals survive?

Organisms in nature relate to one another in many ways. Some hunt one another aspredator and prey. Some relationships between organisms are long lasting.Relationships between two different organisms lasting a long time, is called symbiosis. Some times the relationship is beneficial to other organisms but some times it harms oneor the other. When the relationship is beneficial to both it is called mutualism.

One such mutual relationship is seen between the Yucca Plant and a moth. The strange-looking plant lives in the Mojave Desert in southern California. When the Yucca Plantdevelops a creamy colored flower, there appears a gray shadow darting around the flower. A careful look reveals this shadow is the yucca moth.

This moth cannot survive without the plant. The plant would become extinct if the mothvanished. The two benefit from each other and share a relationship of mutualism. The female yucca moth picks up pollen from the flower and rolls it up into a ball, which itholds in its mouth. The moth moves over another plant and makes a hole in the flower’sovary. The moth injects its eggs through the hole. It packs the sticky ball of pollen ontothe flower’s stigma. The stigma and ovary are female reproductive parts of a flower. Pollen holds male sex cells.

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The moth has pollinated the yucca flower. The pollinated flower can then make seeds. Some of these seeds become new yucca plants.

The tree’s seeds and the moth’s seeds develop at the same time. The eggs hatch intolarvae and feed on some of the seeds. All this is protected inside the ovary wall safe frompredators.

If you have the use of the Internet you may like to look for pictures of this plant and insect.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned new words for relationships of organisms thatdepend on one another in nature.

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Lesson 56

What is the host? What do fleas do to cats and dogs? Are fleas just a nuisance? Did you look up what kindrelationship fleas have for dogs and cats? Did you find out what the fleas do? The dogsand cats are hosts. The relation ship is harmful and it is called parasitism. The organismthat lives on or in the other organism is called a parasite. The organism they feed on iscalled hosts. The parasites benefit from and the host is harmed. The fleas actually live offthe blood of these hosts and give nothing back. They do make the host itchy and irritated.

Plants can have parasites too. There is a bright orange plant called a dodder. It has verylittle chlorophyll, which means it cannot make enough food to live on. It winds itself arounda plant that can make its own food. It sends tubes into the stem of the plant it is coiledaround. The dodder gets food from the plant through the tubes. The host plant does notdie but does get weak.

Some plants can use another plant without causing any harm. The orchid cannot reachthe sunlight from the floor of the rain forest. It attaches itself to the trunk of a tree so it canreach the sun and produce its own food. This kind of relationship benefits one withoutharming is called commensalism.

Some tropical fish are protected from predators by the poison in a sea anemone’stentacles. The fish is not harmed nor is the anemones.

Look back at your vocabulary words. Take some time now to find out if there are anyorganisms that live on humans. How do parasites affect humans? What do they gainfrom their host? Write a paper about what you find.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned more about how living organisms live off or withanother other organisms.

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Lesson 57 Do living things survive the changes to the Earth?

If you take a pencil and make a circle starting at the center of your notebook page andwent around and around until you are near the edge of your notebook page, you can lookat how much time humans have been on the Earth. Put a mark to show where humanshave been on the Earth very near the last spiral around in your spiral. So what was herebefore?

Scientists are always looking for evidence of life on the Earth and how it existed yearsago. They believe that about 18,000 years ago, great sheets of ice moved deep into theheartland of what is now the United States. Ice sheets covered Europe and SouthAmerica. New land was exposed and the Earth was cold.

The Earth began to warm and the ice melted. Changes like these have happened seventimes during the past 700,000 years. This cold period is called the ice age.

Over millions of years, continents moved north and south, east and west. Huge mountain-sized rocks have crashed into Earth. Volcanoes have poured gases and dust into the air.During these changes organisms have survived while others become extinct. Looking atthe age of the dinosaurs scientists have concluded there were other animals on the Earth. Fossils include frogs, snails, insects, turtles, sakes, and some small furry mammals. Plants of all kinds grew everywhere. The waters were full of fish, sea urchins, clams andalgae.

There is a theory that a meteorite struck the Earth. It left the Earth full of dust blocking thesunlight. Animals depending on plants died because the plants could not survive withoutsunlight.

Smaller animals could have survived moving from habitat to habitat and adapting. Thismay be how the Earth, once ruled by dinosaurs, became ruled by mammals.

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You affect your environment at leastfifteen times a minute. Every time youbreathe in and out there is more carbondioxide and water in the air. You removeoxygen when you breathe in. Aircirculates around the Earth. Your airkeeps going through changes and travelsaround the world. Plants use the carbonand animals eat these plants.

People interact with their environment. They can do good and bad things. Theycan interfere with their ecosystem bycutting down too many trees. They canpreserve the system by protecting animalsand plants.

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Lesson 57 Do living things survive the changes to the Earth?

Name: _______________________________ Date: __________________________

Think and respond: What is one way you affect the environment?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about how the Earth has changed over time and yetorganisms have survived.

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Lesson 58 Six Major Biomes

A biome is a large ecosystem. Each biome has it own kind of climate, soil, plants andanimals. There are six major biomes and other minor biomes. We will study the six majorbiomes.

Each major biome is described as the following:

Taiga: location: high latitude; climate: cold; soil: acidic; plants: evergreens;animals: rodents, bears, wolves

Grasslands: location: mid-latitudes; climate: cool; soil: rich; plants: grass;animals: prairie dogs, small mammals (Africa: elephants, lions, zebras,giraffes

Deciduous Forest: location: mid-latitudes; climate: cold winter, mild summer; soil: rich topsoil; plants: hardwoods; animals: wide variety of small mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and insects.

Tropical Rain Forest: Location: near the equator; climate: hot; soil: nutrient-poor; plants: greatest variety of any biome; animals: more speciesof insects, reptiles, amphibians and colorful birds.

Desert: mid-latitudes; climate: very hot; soil: poor in decay products butrich in minerals; plants: none but cacti; animals: rodents, snakes, lizards,tortoises, insects and some birds

Tundra: location: high northern latitudes; climate: very cold, harsh; soil: nutrient-poor, permafrost layer a few inches down; plants: grass, moss; animals: oxen, caribou, hares, owls various rodents, polar bears

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Wikimedia: Sten Porse

Research where each biome exists. What kind of biome do you live in?

Lesson Wrap Up: The Earth has six major biomes. Each biome has specificcharacteristics for its soil, location, soil, plants, and animals.

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Lesson 59A Closer Look

In the grassland biomes there is plenty of grass. There is a irregular amount of rain. Some of the grasslands are temperate zones. That means mild. These grasslands have existed for years. They are called the “bread basket” of the world. The grasslands of the United States and Ukraine are now covered with crops such as wheat, corn and oats.Other grasslands look as they were years also. They are called Savannas and stay warm all year round. Their soil is not as fertile as the temperate ones are. They do get more rain.

In the African Savanna there are more hoofed animals than anywhere else on Earth. The native animals are small and large. They travel in herds. There are zebras, wildebeests, antelopes, hyenas and lions. These areas are disappearing. The land is being used for domestic cattle to graze. The native animals will lose their habitat.

Now stop and think: How are two types of grasslands different?

Another type of biome is the taiga. They are found in North America, Europe, and Asia. Scientists have studied the Earth and how and when it changed. There was a period of time 15,000 years ago that glaciers inched down from the arctic regions. As the hundred feet thick mountains of ice moved over the Earth it dug chunks of land out of these areas.Lakes were formed where the ice melted. Fresh lakes were formed. The lakes and ponds of a cool, forested biome called the taiga.

Taiga is surrounded by confers over eleven percent of the Earth’s land. These areas are found in Alaska, Canada, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia.

You may hear the sound of birds in the summer. In the winter the birds migrate to warmer weather. You may hear a chainsaw. The trees are cut for pulpwood. This lumber is used to build homes. It is also used to make paper.

What is the weather like in the Taiga?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read more information about two of the biomes.

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Lesson 60 How are they alike and different?

Where on Earth is there a Tundra biome? It is where the ground is frozen in the summer. There is very little precipitation in this area. The winters are very cold and icy. Just belowthe surface the ground is frozen solid.

The plants are not usually taller than twelve inches in height. You may see weasels, arcticfoxes, snowshoe hares, hawks, musk oxen and caribou. There are polar bears too. Where would you be?

You are in the far Northern part of the Earth. It is an area between the taiga and the polarice sheets. You will find this in Alaska, northern Canada, Greenland or frigid parts ofEurope or Asia. This cold biome is called tundra.

The weather is so cold because the sun rays are low and come at a glancing angle. Thereis just enough heat from the sun to melt the top layer of the soil. The permafrost or frozensoil is just underneath. The top soil acts like a sponge for the water.

Deep roots cannot get down deep enough to develop. The growing season is only aboutfifty days of the year. The soil is poor in nutrients for large plants.

Do you think you would find any cities or villages in this biome? Why or why not?

Answers will vary.

A desert is a region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation. Three of thelargest desert biomes of the Earth are the Sahara, Gobi and the Atacama. This is asandy, rocky biome with a small amount of rain and little plants.

Each continent has at least one desert. The largest on Earth is the Sahara desert inAfrica. Its sands dip down to the Atlantic Ocean in the west and the Mediterranean Sea tothe north with the Red Sea to the east. It has 3,500,000 miles of land. If you think aboutour 48 continuous states as all sand and that would be like the size of the Sahara desert.The Gobi Desert is in China and Mongolia. This one is about twice the size of Texas. TheAtacama Desert runs 600 miles from the southern tip of Peru down through Chile. It isbetween the Andes Mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean in the west. Few animals and plants live in deserts. Those that do are able to adapt and are veryhardy animals and plants.

Is there anything similar about the tundra and the desert?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read about two biomes with little ability to sustain life.

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Lesson 61 Two more biomes...

Do you live near a forest? Do the leaves thetrees turn colors in the fall of the year? Thenyou live near a deciduous forest biome.

This is the kind of forest that has trees withleaves that turn colors in the fall of the yearand fall off the trees. They cover the ground. These leaves then decay.

Forests like this cover the United States. Many of these forests have been cut down tomake room for towns, cities, farms andfactories.

The animals that once lived in these forestsstill live in these places. You can seechipmunks darting around buses whilesquirrels leap from branch to branch on thetrees that survived.

The birds still live in the remaining deciduousforests. Garter snakes live under rocks. Birdsthat might be seen are robins, cardinals,crows and hawks.

Many of the remaining deciduous forests are part of national parks or where there arefew people living and working. As long as they stay that way, people will be able to seethe changing seasons.

What are the characteristics of a deciduous forest?

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Near the equator there are other kinds of forests. The biomes in the hot temperate zoneof the Earth are not called deciduous. This hot, humid biome with lots of rain is called atropical rain forest.

The trees grown tall and create a canopy over the floor of the forest with their branchesand leaves. This is so thick very little sunlight can reach the floor of the forest. With littlelight, plants are more likely to grow on the trunks of trees. Most of the life in this forest ishigh up in the trees.

You could experience a rain forest in Central America, South America, India, Africa,Southeast Asia, Australia, and many Pacific Islands. Each of these forests has its ownplants and animals. Millions of species of animals live in this kind of environment. Scientists have not even discovered all the different types of species.

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In South American tropical forest have colorful birds like toucans. Giant anacondas live intropical rain forests. The trees of the rain forest have been victims to people cutting themdown for their needs. Now people are replanting and restoring tropical rain forests.

What are some characteristics of the tropical forest?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learn about two different kinds of forests; they are differentbecause they live in different temperate zones of the Earth.

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Lesson 62 How About Water....

Water ecosystems are watery and differ from each other by their saltiness. Plain water iscalled fresh water. The salt and fresh water ecosystems have three main categories oforganisms. Plankton are organisms that float on the water. Nekton swim through thewater and benthos are bottom-dwelling organisms.

Freshwater has plants living in the shallow parts. In lakes, ponds and other fresh waterthere are cattails, reeds, wild rice and arrowheads. There may be frogs, turtles andcrayfish found near the top of fresh water.

In the deeper water we find microscopic plankton like algae and protozoa. Look beneaththe surface and find nekton. There may even be game fish like trout. At the bottom areaquatic worm burrowing into the mud.

There are several sections found in the ocean ecosystem. The shallowest is called theintertidal zone. Here the tide goes in and out covering and uncovering crabs, mussels andbarnacles attached to rocks.

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Two more regions exist further out in the ocean. The first is up to 656 feet deep. Manylarge fish and whales live. The 150 ton blue whales live here.

The lower region goes from the 656 feet deep to the oceans bottom. The bottom can be3,281 feet from the surface and there is no sunlight. It is completely dark.

Nothing that needs sunlight can live here. There are fantastic creatures in the dark. Someof these creatures light up. Others are blind. Can you imagine what they may look like?Think: What are the two water ecosystems and how are they different?

As years have passed on the Earth there have been many changes to the waterecosystem. People used to hunt whales when there were plenty of whales. As thecenturies passed whale hunting increased. Over the time with new technology huntingbecame easier and more efficient. By 1962, 66,000 whales were being killed. Whales didnot have enough time to reproduce. Extinction threatened the blue whales, humpbacks,bowheads and right whales.

The whales were used for human and animal food, oil for lamps and fertilizers. In 1946people realized they did not need whales for these things. In the following years lawswere passed and whales are protected.

Our world biomes remain constant as long as their climates and populations do notchange greatly. Human and natural activities can change biomes. Biomes can affect thekinds of plants and animals that can live there. It is important for people to protect thebiomes.

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Lesson 63 Think and Write

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

It is time to put your knowledge into a creative project. Answer the following questions forin your science notebook. Then you will choose a country and construct a map. You willneed to draw each biome located in the country and show which plants and animals live init.

Answer in complete sentences. You may use your lessons to help you remember thefacts.

1. Describe the taiga biome in terms of its climate, soil, and inhabitants.

location: high latitude; climate: cold; soil: acidic; plants: evergreens; animals: rodents, bears, wolves

2. How do organisms found in desert and tundra biomes adapt to their environments?

Answers will vary.

3. Explain why few plants live on the floor of tropical rain forests.

Tropical rain forest trees grow so thick that very little sunlight can get through to thefloor of the forest. Most life grows on the trunks of the trees.

4. Describe the two types of aquatic ecosystems.

Freshwater and saltwater. They differ from each other by their saltiness.

Now choose your country. Look up the country. Identify the major cities in that country. Now draw that country.

Draw each biome and show, which plants and animals live, in your country.Answers will vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Review lesson of the biomes.

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Lesson 63 Think and Write

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

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Lesson 64 Ecosystems....how they change

How does nature change the Earth? How does nature change an abandoned farm’s fields into aflourishing forest? Imagine anabandoned farm. It would not haveits fields planted but rather justempty with weeds growing. A yearlater the weeds grow taller and there may be some wild flowers andanimals living in the field. Four to six year later there may be sometrees growing with more animals and birds. Give that field twenty-five years later and you may see aforest with even larger wild animals.

So what happened over thoseyears? The field got hot and dry. Pine seeds sprouted. This providedshade so more birds joined thecommunity of small mammals. Thenumber of new pine seedlingsdrops because they cannot grow inthe shade. Seeds of deciduoustrees such as maple, hickory andoak trees sprout. Now largeranimals can survive here. Thereare now deer, squirrels, raccoonsand foxes in this new forest.

So an abandoned farm field can become a forest. Scientists call this gradual replacementof one community by another ecological succession. Ecological succession can begin intwo different kinds of places. It can begin where a community already exists such as in anabandoned farm field. Ecological succession in a place where a community already existsis called secondary succession.

Ecological succession can also happen where there are few, if any, living things. This iscalled primary succession. Primary succession can begin where communities were wipedout. Such places include land that is cleaned by a volcanic eruption. It can also beginwhere communities never existed before such as landmasses rising from the sea.

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In 1980 the United States experienced a volcano erupting. It happened in the state ofWashington but it affected many states beyond there. It was Mount Saint Helens thatblasted into the sky. It knocked down the thousands of trees that grew in the area. Itcovered the whole area knee high with ash and finely smashed up rock.

Not a blade of grass could be seen for miles. The landscape was shaded in gray. In ayear you could go back and the cloud is gone. Wind and rain have cleared some of theash. Seeds and fruits from the nearby forests have blown near the area. There are somerose-purple objects among the charred tree trunks. They are flowers of a plant calledfireweed. It is often the first plant to grow after a forest fire.

Scientists call the fireweed a pioneer species. That is because it is the first species to livein a lifeless area. The plants attract animals and insects. A new community is formed. This is called a pioneer community.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about how an ecosystem can change.

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Lesson 65 Changes in the Earth change populations

The Earth is very old. We know this because we study the Earth surface. When thescientists look at what they find, we learn about changed in the Earth. The scientists havea theory called plate tectonics.

The Earth’s crust is made up of moving plates or pieces of crust. Six million years ago twoplates between Africa and Eurasia collided. The continents of Africa and Europe bumpedinto each other. This created a natural dam between the Atlantic Ocean and theMediterranean Sea.

Sea dried up and became a desert. The marine life died out. Animals and plants migratedto Europe. Again five million years ago the dam broke apart and allowed water to flow intothe desert. The Mediterranean became a sea again. What do you think happened to thepeople when this happened?

Our planet is constantly changing. The continents move north, south, east and west. Climates change from cold to hot, hot to cold, wet to dry, dry to wet. Communities change.Fossils found in Italy showed that fish and sea creatures disappeared from theMediterranean Sea. Horse-like animal fossils from Africa were found in Europe. Palmtree fossils were dug up in Switzerland. Five million year old fossils of fish were found inthe Mediterranean area. These were some of the discoveries that convinced scientiststhat the plates of the Earth moved and changed the Earth’s crust over time.

Things we find in the Earth’s crust are like treasures. There is gold, silver, aluminum, iron,copper, and many more. Each and every one of these treasures has been used by peopleover time. Iron is used for the steel for making buildings, bridges, ships, trains and piecesof machinery. Electricity is conducted through copper. Metals play an important part inour society.

In order to use these natural things we carve our Earth’s surface. This is called surfacemining, open-pit mining, or strip mining. The United States alone has cleared an area ofthe Earth as big as three fourth of the area of the state of Rhode Island. The surface-mined land has harmful things to living plants and animals. This is washedinto our waterways with rain. The wind picks up the dust and pollutes our air. Livingthings are harmed.

How are people affected by mining?

The activities and health of all living things on Earth are interconnected. What happens toone living thing and one ecosystem usually affects other living things and otherecosystems. Human activities can both harm and help our ecosystem. Think about waysyou may affect your environment.

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Lesson 66 Review Lessons

Name: ___________________________________________Date: ______________

Use these words to complete the sentences.

TaigaTundraBiomeAdaptationSymbiosis

Pioneer communityMutualismDeserts Climax communityParasitism

1. The Gobi and Mojave are deserts .

2. There are many evergreen trees in the Tundra .

3. Characteristic that allows organisms to survive is called a(n) adaption .

4. Part of the soil in the Taiga is frozen all the time.

5. The first organisms to colonize are made up in a(n) pioneer community .

6. Two organisms relationship benefits one while it harms another is called

parasitism .

7. The relationship between two organisms which benefits both is called

mutualism .

8. When ecological succession slows down a(n) climax community has formed.

9. A relationship that last from one generation to the next is a(n) symbiosis .

10. A deciduous forest is an example of a(n) biome .

Choose the correct answer: Which of these is a parasitic plant: fir tree or orchid

Which can harm the environment: trees are cut down and land is cleared or new

trees are planted

Which one of these is a relationship that benefits both organisms over time:

mutualism or parasitism

Which of these is an example of a biome: a pond or grassland

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How do the shallow roots of the barrel cactus help it survive in the desert: soaking

up rain very quickly or resisting flood damage

Write a paragraph to answer this statement:

Explain how a change in the biome you live in affects your way of life.

Answers will vary.

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Lesson 67 Earth's Neighbors

Do you remember the names of the planets in our Solar System? You would be correct ifyou named: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune andPluto.

Consider the planets are not standing still in one place. They are moving around the Sunin a path. The question you will consider is what holds the planets in their path as theypass around the Sun?

You will need: a ball of clay, string, scissors and a meter stick.

Make a mode: cut 40 cm length of string. Wrap that around a small, round lump orclay about the size of a baseball. Wrap it in several directions so it will hold. Measure and tie a 60 cm of string to the string of the ball.

Observe as you spin the ball of clay slowly around yourself. This should be just fastenough to keep the string tight but keeping the ball off the ground. In yournotebook, describe the path of the ball.

As you spin the ball, let it go. What happens? What path does the ball take? Repeat this so you can understand what is happening.

What can you conclude about the Solar System from what you have done?

What represents the Earth and the Sun? How did you represent the force betweenthem?

Explain what happened when you let the string go. Why did that happen?

How would your results change if the mass of your ball were doubled or tripled? How does mass affect the pull on the string?

What is our Solar System? It is our Sun and the objects that are traveling around it. OurSun is similar to other stars except it is much closer to our planet. It appears large andbright. It is composed of hydrogen and helium. The formation of helium from hydrogen iswhat generates light and heat from the Sun.

There are planets that travel around the Star in a path. The path is called an orbit. Planets do not give off light. They reflect the light of the Sun. The orbit is oval in shape.

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One complete trip of an object in its orbit around the Sun takes one year. The length ofthe year is different from planet to planet. For Earth one year is 365.25 days.

Here is a chart of the days and distance of the planets in the Solar System.

Mercury 57.9 million km 88 daysVenus 108.2 224 daysEarth 149.6 365 daysMars 227.9 687 daysJupiter 778.3 4, 333 daysSaturn 1,427 10,759 daysUranus 2,870 30,685 daysNeptune 4,497 60,188 days

All of these days were calculated according to the length of one day on Earth.

What are the parts of a Solar System? Write your response in your notebook.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students looked at what the path of a planet is like in our solar system.

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Lesson 68 How are the planets kept in their orbit?

Now having an idea of the system of our Solar System, consider the question how do theplanets stay in their path or orbit. They are not connected to a string. Scientists havewondered about that and 300 years ago Sir Isaac Newton came up with an idea. Hedescribed an invisible force holding the Sun and the planets.

He called the force gravity. He described that force as a property of all matter. It is a forceof attraction, or pull, between any object and any other object around it.

Gravity depends on two measurements: mass and distance. The more matter, or mass,in an object, the greater the pull in the object’s direction. The closer two objects are, thestronger the pull of gravity between them.

Newton applied this to explain how most objects behave. He includes all objects on Earth,in the solar system and beyond. His ideas are called the law of universal gravitation.According to Newton’s law, there is a force of attraction between you and the Earth. Earthpulls you. You pull Earth. When you stumble, why do you fall down? Why doesn’t Earthfall up?

Comparing you to the Earth, the Earth has more mass. Your gravitational pull is less. Earth’s gravity is very strong because of its mass. Earth’s gravity is so strong everythingnear it moves in its direction. That is why you fall “down”.

The Sun has more mass than the Earth. So its gravitation pull is stronger than the Earth’s. The sun holds all the objects in its system. Without gravity, Earth and all of the otherobjects orbiting the Sun would go flying into space.

It is believed that Sir Isaac Newton came up with his law of gravity when an apple droppedon his head.

Now if gravity was the only law in nature, the Earth would be pulled directly to the Sun. Sowhat else is there? The reason is the Earth is moving. The planets have a property calledinertia. This is the tendency of a moving object to keep moving in a straight line. So there are two forces keep the planet in their orbit. The planet moves in a straight linebut gravity “steers” the planets in their oval paths. It is gravity and inertia that keep theplanets in their orbits. Rethink your experiment with your ball of clay. The clay had inertiaand gravity working on it too. If you had made your ball bigger it would have had moremass and move differently than the smaller ball of clay.

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On the other side of your planet paper you could draw a big ball of sun on one side of thepaper. Draw a ball representing the Earth directly (straight line) from the sun. Gravitywould pull these two together. Inertia would result in the Earth following a path and drawanother planet moving around the sun. Gravity and inertia together make the Earth followa path around the Sun and not straight out.

In your notebook, explain how gravity and inertia keep a planet in orbit.

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Lesson 69 What is inertia?

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Lesson 69 What is inertia?

Name: Date:

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Lesson Wrap Up:

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Lesson 70 Spinning Planets

The Sun does more than keep the planets in their orbits. It provides heat and light. TheSun is the reason for the light of day and warmth. All of the planets not only rotate aroundthe sun but it spins on its axis.

At one time half of the Earth is facing the Sun. It has daylight. At that same time the otherside of the Earth has no sunlight and it is the dark night. In time the Earth turn and daybecome night and night becomes day. Each planet makes one complete spin in its day. Each planet has its own speed of turning. The length of a day is different for each planet.How long it takes the planet to spin around one complete time depends on the size of theplanet and how fast it is turning.

Here are the planets and their number of hours it takes for one day using Earth’s time, arelisted here:

Mercury 59 days Venus 243 days Earth 24 hours Mars 24 hours 30 minutesJupiter 9 hours 56 minutesSaturn 10 hours 40 minutesUranus 17 hours 14 minutesNeptune 16 hours 6 minutes

This list shows the time it takes each planet to complete on “spin” in Earth hours or days. Now take the list and copy them in your notebook with the shortest day to the longest. Areyou surprised at the length of some of the days?

The amount of heat and light each planet receives from the Sun depends on how far it isfrom the Sun.

Earth is in a position from the Sun to receive just the right amount of heat and light toprovide living things with what they need to survive. Why are there different seasons of the year in opposite places on the Earth? Earth’s orbitis slightly stretched circle or an oval path. This shape brings Earth slightly closer to theSun during part of the year and farther away during other parts of the year. In theNorthern Hemisphere, Earth is slightly closer to the Sun during winter than summer. Thenhow come it is colder in winter than and warmer in the summer?

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The answer is that the Earth travels with a tilt. Think of the Earth having a stick that runsfrom the North Pole to the South Pole. Now take the Earth and slant the Earth by holdingthe “stick” slightly to one side. You could actually do this with a ball; put a stick through itfrom top to bottom. Now place another ball down. Use the ball with the slant goingaround the big ball in the center of a circle. As you move the “planet” ball around the sun,using a pencil in four equal positions around the sun pointing to the spot the Earth willpass by the sun.

What you will notice is the sun’s rays represented by the pencils will “hit” the Earth indifferent spots as it travels in its orbit around the Sun. The four seasons of the year arecreated by rays of the Sun.

Winter in the Northern Hemisphere starts around December 21, when the direct rays ofthe sun are hitting the Earth at 147 Million kilometers. Summer in Northern Hemispherestarts around June 21 and the direct rays of the sun come at 152 million kilometers. TheNorthern Hemisphere is titled toward the Sun in the summer and away from the direct raysof the Sun in the winter.

The Sun is high in the sky all year and hit the Earth directly in the “fattest” part of theEarth. This is what we call the equator. There is less change in seasons on that part ofthe Earth. The surfaces warm up more than other areas too. Dark soils heat up morethan light-colored sands. As a result, Earth ends up with a whole range of temperaturessupporting many different kinds of life on Earth.

Use your notebook and write how Earth’s tilt brings about the seasons of the year.

Lesson Wrap Up: The Sun’s rays create seasons of the year on Earth.

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Lesson 71 The surface of the Earth

Is the Earth made up of all solidsor are there gases and water? We know from the pictures takenfrom outer space that our planetis three-quarters water. Webreathe oxygen and recognizethat is invisible gas. We wouldnot survive without the water wedrink daily. The Sun interactswith all of these parts of ourplanet.

Scientists have named the solidground the crust. This is madeup of rock and includes thecontinents and the ocean floor. The hard, outer layer of theEarth is about 62.14 miles thickand is called the lithosphere. The crust of the Earth includessoil and many resources. Earthhas high mountains, and lowvalleys.

The hydrosphere accounts for the trillions of liters of water on the Earth. Water is avaluable resource. Most of this water is ocean. It is salty because of the minerals thathave been washed into it over the ages. It includes rivers, streams, underground waterand ice. This is the source of fresh water used for drinking, cooking and bathing. The hydrosphere a big heat absorber. Water changes temperature slowly as compared tothe land. The earth’s oceans keep the temperature on Earth from changing too drastically.

Outer space pictures also reveal white clouds swirling in the atmosphere. Theatmosphere has several layers of gases. It contains gases that help protect Earth fromforms of harmful energy from the Sun.

Our closest neighbor is our Moon. It is 240,000 miles from the Earth. We have looked atit with telescopes. We have astronauts who have landed on and walked on the Moon.

Of course, we are looking for similarities between Earth and the Moon. There are noclouds or oceans. There are no hills covered with forests; in fact there is no sign of life.

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The Moon has no hydrosphere with virtually no atmosphere. There is no water to drinkand no air to breathe. There is no weather because with no atmosphere, to trap the heatof the Sun, temperatures change greatly during a Moon day.

The Moon has a lithosphere which is a rocky surface. You can see the features of thesurface with a telescope. It has a dark-colored region called maria. Maria is Latin for“seas”. They are dry, flat lands surrounded by mountains and ridges.

The Mon’s surface is covered with huge dents, called craters. Trails of rock and dustextend out from them. They reflect sunlight and look like rays coming out of the crater.The Moon is not a planet. It travels in an orbit around the Earth. “Moon” light is actually“Sun” light. Your part of Earth is facing the Sun at night. Sun’s light reaches the Moonand bounces into space. Some of this reflected light reaches Earth.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned more about of the vocabulary for the parts of theEarth.

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Lesson 72 What are constellations?

What else do you see besides the moon in the night sky? If the sky is dark enough youwill see the stars. A star is a large, hot ball of gas that is held together by gravity andgives off its own light. Stars look like points of light in the night sky. Stars are far outsideour solar system. Our Sun is a medium star and is the closest one to our planet. Years ago people looked at the sky and saw a pattern in the stars. These patterns arecalled constellations. People looked at the patterns and thought they looked like picturesof animals or people.

Some of the stars have names. One is called the Rigel star. When people looked in thesky they decided that the star Rigel was part of the pattern of stars that formed the hunter. They stay in a formation even though they appear to move. As Earth travels in its orbit

around the Sun, its “night side” faces different directions. You see only the constellationsthat are in that direction. The constellation Orion is seen from the Northern Hemisphere inthe winter season.

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In the summer sky people located in the Northern Hemisphere can see the constellationsCorona Borealis and Aquila. In the fall sky Pegasus is visible. The winter sky revealsCanis Major and the spring sky has Leo.

Earth is teaming with life and movement. The Sun is the source of life to the Earth. Itproduces seasons, day-to-day weather and climates.

When the Astronauts visited the Moon, they had to prepare for their trip by thinking aboutwhat they would need to survive. They had to bring all of the things they would need.Earth is the only planet that supports life as we know it.

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Lesson 72 What are constellations?

Name: __________________________________________Date:______________

How is gravity important to Earth?

Without gravity, Earth and all of the other objects orbiting the Sun would go flyinginto space.

How does the Sun affect life on Earth?

Earth is in a position from the Sun to receive just the right amount of heat and lightto provide living things with what they need to survive.

Why is the Moon unlivable compared with the Earth? The Moon has no hydrosphere with virtually no atmosphere. There is no water todrink and no air to breathe. There is no weather because with no atmosphere, totrap the heat of the Sun, temperatures change greatly during a Moon day.

Now take some time to research the solar system or constellations. Learn more about theEarth and its neighbors. What do the planets look like? Answers will vary.

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Make a model of the Solar System by using a hanger, string and construction paper orclay. Make models of the planets and hang them from the hanger in the order they orbitthe Sun. Models will vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read more about our Solar System and continued with theirstudy through research.

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Lesson 73 How does the crust of the Earth change?

Did you feel that! If you live in California you may have experienced the movement of theEarth. It happens in other places of the Earth too. What is it? It is the Earth moving. When it moves quickly enough it may be seen and felt. Big movements of the Earth arecalled Earthquakes.

The crust of our Earth has weak points. These weak points or cracks in the crust of theEarth are called faults. These may have formed years before or while the earthquake ishappening.

During an earthquake there are vibrations traveling through the crust. The crust moves oneither side of the crack or both sides. People far away from the earthquake may not feelthe vibrations while those close by will feel the affects of the quake.

A device called a seismograph will record the motion and location of the vibrations. Mostof the time the Earth moves so slowly you cannot feel it. It may take centuries for therocks around a fault to move. People only recognize the movement when somethingvisible changes position.

Another way the Earth’s crust moves is like what happens when you take a newspaperthat is folded in half. Push the pages together from the sides. All those pages of thenewspaper would represent all the layer of the Earth. The part of the newspaper thatmoves up represents the hills and mountains that the bending motion may affect. To measure crust movement, surveyors measure elevation of the earth. Elevation is howhigh the land is in relation to sea level. They leave plaques called benchmarks that tell theexact location and elevation of a place. When they re-measure they find where the Earth’scrust has risen or sunk.

Geologist, scientists who study Earth, place sensitive devices all along faults. They arehoping to record any tiny movement and be able to predict an earthquake. The Earth’s crust is a hard surface. It is very thin. It is only about one-thousandth ofEarth’s thickness.

Under the crust is the mantle of the Earth and is the thickest layer. Rock material is solid. Like putty can move when squeezed, this section can “flow”. Just below the mantle is thecore of the Earth. This section has two parts; a liquid outer core and a solid inner core.

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Lesson 73 How does the crust of the Earth change?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

Draw a half circle

In the center, color a yellow section labeling it CORE. Put a spot of black right inthe center and label this the inner core.

From the outside of the core, use red and color all of this area. Label it mantle. Draw oblong circle with arrows pointing around it. Where the arrow is going towardthe bottom of the circle label it sinking. Where the arrow is pointing up toward thecrust label it rising. These are convection currents.

Color the thin line on the outside of the half circle brown and label it crust. Withinthat near crust there are plates.

In the mantle the rock material is in motion like heated water. It rises and pushesagainst the bottom of the crust. This causes the think, brittle crust to break intopieces or plates. Plates move along the Earth’s surface. Earthquakes and the slowmotions of the crust all result from moving plates.

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Now take your notebook and answer this question: How are earthquakes related tofaults and plates in the crust? Earth faults. During an earthquake there are vibrations traveling through the crust. Thecrust moves on either side of the crack or both sides.

Lesson Wrap Up: The Earth has layers and is in motion.

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Lesson 74 Forces in the Crust

The plates of the Earth move and collide with one another. Sometimes they pull awayfrom each other. They slide past each other. This movement causes these three kinds offorces that act on the Earth’s crust.

Tension stretches or pulls apart the crust. Compression squeezes or pushes together the crust. Shear twists, tears, or pushes one part of the crust past another.

Each forces a fault to form in the crust. Each can cause movement along a fault. Theseforces can also result in other kinds of motion in the crust. Each of these forces can causea fault to form. Each can cause movement along a fault. These forces can also result inother kinds of motion in the crust.

As the Earth moves upward the land is built up. Compression can crumple rock layers intowavy folds. Mountains can be formed when two pieces of crust crash together. Theimpact of squeezes causes it to crumple into huge folds. Mountains made of crumpledand folded layers of rock are called fold mountains. The Alps and Himalayas are allranges of fold mountains.

Tension and shear can also build up the crust of the Earth. Mountains can be formed, asthe crust is pulled apart.

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Hot molten rock deep below Earth’s surface, called magma, rises upward. If magmareaches the surface, it may flow out as lava. When a volcano erupts lava flows out or ishurled out. The volcanoes lava is gushing up through a crack between two pieces of crustthat are being pulled apart.

Tension and shear also cause great blocks of crust to break apart cleanly and move alongfaults. Blocks of crust moving along a fault can form fault-block mountains. Suchmountains have formed along several western states.

In your notebook, record three forces that act on the Earth’s crust?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned about three forces that cause changes in the Earth’scrust.

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Lesson 75 Are there other forces that shape the Earth?

While the Earth is being formed from underneath there are forces at work on top of thecrust. Weathering and erosion are breaking down the materials of the Earth into smallerpieces. Erosion is picking up and carrying away the pieces of the crust. They have beenaround for billions of years.

Physical weathering happens when the crust is exposed to water, air, and changes intemperature. How do these break down rocks?

Water can break down the crust by dissolving some minerals right out of the crust. Movingwater can make pieces of rock bang into each other. Small chips break off the surfaceand the rock get smaller. The churning waters of a stream can wear down big pieces ofrock into small rounded pebbles.

Wind is moving air as the sand blows the broken bits over the Earth. These particles alsowear away rock.

If the temperature drops low enough, water can freeze. When water freezes it expands, ortakes up more space. Water freezing in cracks in rocks expands against the rock. Theforce of the expanding water is so great that it can split the rock apart.

Changes in temperature also cause rocks to expand and contract. A rock may be made ofa number of different materials. One part may expand and in another material contractcausing a push or pull against itself. Eventually the rock may split apart.

Gases in the atmosphere react chemically and may form new substances. Oxygen, forinstance, reacts with iron to form rust. Acids are formed by carbon dioxide and sulfurdioxide in our rain. A limestone cavern was solid rock. The acid rainwater seeps throughthe rock and dissolves part of it. This can eat away and form huge holes such as cavernsin the rock.

Erosion is the carrying away of pieces of weathered rock by gravity, water, wind, and ice. Piece by piece erosion can carry away a boulder, a hill, or even a whole mountain range.Water is the greatest agent of erosion. When a drop of rain falls to the earth’s surface iterodes the land. Think of how many raindrops fall in a rainstorm. They can move a lot ofsoil.

The water flows downhill. Moving water can push and carry things along with it. It picksup pieces of rock and carries them downhill. The faster the water is moving, the bigger thepieces of rock can be moved.

How do weathering and erosion work together to shape Earth’s surface?

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Lesson 76


deposition


Lesson 76 What about the glaciers of the Earth?

Name: ____________________________________________Date: _______________


Wind is moving air as the sand blows the broken bits over the Earth. These particles also wear away rock. Rocks of all sizes become frozen into the bottom of a glacier. As the glacier moves, the rock scratches and wears down the Earth surface.

Layer by layer, pile after pile, bits and pieces of rock deposited by water, wind and ice build up on the Earth’s surface in another place.

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Lesson 77 How about the surface of the Moon?

Is there anything about the surface of the earth and the surface of the moon that is thesame? Both belong to our Solar System. The earth’s surface has earthquakes andvolcanoes. There is no evidence of any of these happening on the surface of the Moon. There is not air and water to cause weathering. There are no glaciers, nor wind. Thereare other materials in space.

Rocks are part of space. When a rock from space strikes the surface of the Moon it iscalled a meteorite. Craters are formed by the impact by these meteorites. These arecraters create holes big enough to be seen from Earth. Other craters are as tiny as asingle mineral crystal.

Can meteorite hit the surface of the earth? Would they produce craters too? Yes this canhappen. However the earth’s atmosphere protects its surface from many such impacts.As rocks pass through the earth’s surface, they burn up. The moon does not have anatmosphere as thick as the earth’s.

Meteorite impacts shatter rocks on the moon and also create a lot of heat. The neat meltsthe rock. Pieces of rock may melt together and droplets and globs of molten rock canspatter outward. Over time continual meteorite impacts break down the rock. The end

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result is a mixture of shattered pieces or rock, rock droplets and melted-together bits ofrock. As a result, the surface of the Moon is changed by meteorites.

Natural forces change the surface of the planets. As the solar system has been explored,evidence of surface changes and erosion has been found on other planets. Venus hasthousands of volcanoes. Mars has the largest volcano in the solar system.

Jupiter’s moons surface demonstrates constructive and destructive forces. There arevolcanoes erupting and some water and ice. The presence of water, organic compoundsand internal heat mean life may be possible there.

Think about what you read and respond to these questions in your notebook:

What evidence is there that the earth’s crust has moved?

What are the three types of forces acting on earth’s crust?

How do they measure earthquakes?

What is the difference between weathering and erosion?

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Lesson 78 What can we find in the crust of the Earth?

Digging into the crust of the Earth reveals many different substances. Many of thematerials are minerals. Some are made of chemical compounds and others are two ormore elements joined together. Minerals are solid materials of Earth’s crust. Ones madeof one element are gold, silver, copper and carbon.

Each mineral has a definite chemical composition. Scientists can classify minerals byidentifying the elements or compounds they are made of. In these minerals the atoms andmolecules fall into fixed patterns. These patterns cause minerals to form geometricshapes called crystals. Different patterns form different crystal shapes.

The six main crystal shapes are: hexagonal is the shape for lead, tetragonal is the shapefor copper, cubic is the shape for rock salt, orthorhombic is the shape for jewels used injewelry, monoclinic is the shape for talc powder and triclinic is what is used in china plates. Just seeing a china plate will not show you the crystal form of these minerals. Thesewords will only make sense to you if you look them up and see what shapes they form. No two minerals are exactly alike. Each has a different composition. Each has its own setof properties that you can use to tell them apart. A crystals shape is one property. Aproperty is a way to recognize a mineral. Find out the crystal shape is not an easy way toidentify a mineral.

Here is a simpler way to recognize a mineral:

The color of a mineral is the first thingyou see. You can observe color on afresh surface. Color alone does notidentify most minerals because someminerals come in a variety of colorsand weather can discolor it.

Luster is the way light bounces off amineral. Minerals with a metallic lusterare shiny, like metals. Graphic has ametallic luster.

Minerals with a nonmetallic luster maylook shiny or dull. Nonmetallic luster can be described as glassy, waxy, pearly, earthy,oily, or silky. Talc has a nonmetallic luster often described as oily.

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Lesson 79 How do they form?

Where are the minerals of the Earth? In those rocks you pick up and look at. Minerals aremade up of rocks. If you examine a rock with a hand lens you can often find some of themost common rock-forming minerals in the rock.

How do minerals form in these rocks? Some form from the hot liquid rock or magma fromvolcanoes. It cools and hardens into a solid. The magma has molecules that move veryfast. When it cools its molecules slow down and get closer together. They connect into apattern forming crystals. The longer it takes the more time the crystals have to grow andlarger than get.

Other are minerals are deep with the Earth. The temperature of the deep Earth is hot. The weights of rocks press down like a pressure cooker. The heat and pressure produceminerals such as diamonds. Movements of the Earth’s crust bring the minerals nearer thesurface where it can be mined.

Crystals are formed fromcooling water. Waterheated by magma insidethe Earth is rich indissolved minerals. Hotwater can hold moredissolved minerals thancold water. As the watercools, it is able to holdless of the dissolvedminerals. The mineralsthat can no longer staydissolved form crystals.

Some minerals areformed after waterevaporates. Oceanwater contains manydissolved substances. As ocean waterevaporates, thesubstances that weredissolved form crystals.

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Common table salt is mined in areas that were once covered with salt water. The salt isthe mineral halite. It was left behind when an ancient sea evaporated.

Research different minerals.

Lesson Wrap Up: Minerals are found in the Earth’s surface

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Lesson 80 How else can you identify minerals?

Have you ever seen a diamond? What did it look like? You probably could see it was acrystal with luster. The luster was how it allows light to bounce off it. One of qualities of adiamond is how hard it is. How is a mineral tested for hardness?

Hardness is a measure of how well a mineral resists scratching. Soft minerals are easilyscratched. There is a scale called the Mohs’ scale. This is how it works. They useddifferent minerals and scratched them with things from a fingernail to a plate. They putnumbers next to the things that can scratch the mineral.

Talc/gypsum gets a 1-2 for hardness because it will scratch with a fingernail. Calcite gets a 3 because it can be scratched with a copper penny Fluorite is a 4 because it can be scratched with an iron nail Apatite is a 5 because it can be scratched with a glass plate Feldspar is 6 as it can be scratched with steel file Quartz is a 7 on the scale scratching with a streak plate Topaz 8 Corundum 9 Diamond 10

The last three minerals are the hardest minerals in our Earth.

Streak is the color of the powder left when a mineral is rubbed against a hard, roughsurface. Rub it against a porcelain streak plate. The streak is always the same for a givenmineral, even if the mineral varies in color.

The streak may not be the color of the outer surface of the mineral. Fool’s gold, pyrite, isbrassy yellow, but it has a greenish black streak. Gold has a yellow streak. You wouldneed a streak plate to identify real gold.

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One more identifier is cleavage. Cleavage is the way a mineral beaks. This property isthe tendency of a mineral to break along flat surfaces. It is described by the number ofdirections, or planes, along which the mineral breaks.

Many do not break smoothly. They are said to have fracture. Quartz shows jagged edgeswhen it breaks. Some minerals have special properties that help you identify them.

Magnetite is attracted by a magnet. Some mineralsare denser than others. That means they a lot moremass packed into them to give them volume. Densitymakes a sample feel quite heavy. Gold, silver andgalena are dense minerals.

In your notebook, answer the following: Where are

minerals found? How are minerals identified?

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Lesson 81 How are minerals used?

What minerals did you find as you looked around your room or house? Minerals are usedin many products from light bulbs to steel. Now look again.

Some of the most useful minerals are called ores. An ore is a mineral that contains auseful substance. Where there is ore with useful mineral, it is profitable to mine the ore.One of these minerals is hematite. It comes from mining iron. Iron is used to make nails,building and ships. Aluminum comes from the bauxite. It is used for food wrap foil, soft-drink cans and pie tins. Can you think of other things it may be used for?

The iron and aluminum that come from these two ores are metals. Metals have manyuseful properties. Metals conduct electricity and can be stretched for wire.

Aluminum is lightweight and strong. Magnesium has these properties too. These metalsare ideal for use in building jets and spacecrafts.

Gems are minerals. Gems are found in jewelry stores placed in rings and other forms ofjewelry. They are rare and beautiful. Diamond, the hardest mineral, is one of the mostdesirable gems. Rubies and sapphires are other gemstones.

Which gem represents you birthstone?What are two types of useful minerals?

Minerals are nonrenewable resources. They cannot be replaced as trees can be. Theytake so long to form that they cannot be replaced in your lifetime.

Because minerals are nonrenewable, they must be conserved. To conserve means to“use wisely or avoid waste”. One way people can conserve minerals is by recycling them;finding ways to treat them or use them again. Researchers can also come up withsubstitutes to use in place of natural minerals. Many diamonds used in industry for cuttingstone, are not natural diamonds.

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Lesson 81 How are minerals used?

Name: ___________________________ Date: _______________________________

Which properties are most useful in identifying a mineral?

Streak, hardness and cleavage.

How does time affect crystals? Minerals that can no longer stay dissolved formcrystals.

How are metallic ores used? Iron is used to make nails, building and ships. Aluminum comes from the bauxite. Itis used for food wrap foil, soft drink cans and pie tins.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students learned that minerals are used in many products. Nonrenewable minerals should be cared for.

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Lesson 82 Treasure chests...


Lesson Wrap Up:

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Lesson 83 What are sedimentary rocks?

Do you know what the word sedimentary means? It is a word that comes from Latin andmeans to settle or settling. Like when you settle down in a chair and relax. Scientistsused this root word sediment to mean matter that settles to the bottom of a liquid. Geology matter that is carried by water or wind and deposited on the surface of the landand may in time become consolidated into rock.

How do sedimentary rocks compare to igneous rocks? Sedimentary rocks are made ofsmall bits of matter joined together. These bits of matter are bits of weathered rocks. They may be shells or other remains of living things. They are formed on the Earth’ssurface rather than under the Earth’s surface.

Sedimentary rocks are formed by being compacted orcemented together. The weight of layer upon layer ofsediment on top of each other compacts or squeezessediment together.

Bits of minerals glue coarser sediments together. Dissolved minerals in water, act as the glue to helpform the new rock. The water evaporates and themineral crystals form. It is the crystals that form the

solid rock. Rocks are named by the sediment that form the rock. Silt helps form siltstone, sand forms sandstone and gravel is part of conglomerate rocks. Limestone consists mostly of calcite. The mineral is dissolved in ocean water. As thewater is evaporated the calcite is left behind as solid limestone.

Some sedimentary rocks are made of substances that were once part of, or made by,living things. Cemented together shells form coquina. Coral skeletons form corallimestone.

How do we use sedimentary rocks? Is coal a rock? Do we use coal; if so for what? There is a kind of sedimentary rock that is coal. It is called bituminous coal or soft coal. Earth’s supplies of coals were formed millions of years ago from dead plants buried inancient swamps and forests. Coal today is a source of energy, the energy that comes frothose ancient forms of life.

Sandstone is used for buildings and trim. Limestone is used for buildings, trim,monuments and even part benches. Shale is often broken into pieces that are mixed withother materials to make concrete and cement.

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Sedimentary rocks are very useful in helping to piece together Earth’s history. They oftencontain clues, called fossils, to life long ago. Fossils are the remains or imprints of livingthings of the past.

The remains of dead organisms were often covered with mud, sand, or other sediment. Living things leave a imprint like a fingerprint on the soft mud. The imprint hardens intothe rock. Almost all fossils are found in sedimentary rocks.

Why do you think fossils could not be found in an igneous rock?

Lesson Wrap Up: Learning about sedimentary rocks, what they are and how they arefound.

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Lesson 84 One more kind of rock...

Rocks that are deep under ground are under going constant change. Have you ever beenat the bottom of a pile of your friends? If you are there very long you will experience afeeling of heat and pressure. Rocks deep under the crust of the Earth are under pressurefrom the rocks lying above.

Wikimedia Commons: Quartzite, a form of metamorphic rock, from the Museum of Geology atUniversity of Tartu collection.

Heat and pressure can actually change one kind of rock to another. The new rock iscalled a metamorphic rock. Under this pressure and heat the original rock does not meltaway. It remains solid until the mineral grains may flatten and line up. The mineral maychange their identity by exchanging with another substance in the surroundings. Or theminerals may separate into layers of different densities.

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So if you have a limestone under heat and pressure the new rock is marble. A piece ofgranite under pressure and heat may produce gneiss rock.

How are metamorphic rocks used? In their new form these rocks have new properties thatare useful.

Slate is a metamorphic rock produced from shale which is a sedimentary rock. Slate hasthe quality of being tightly packed so water cannot seep through. This is used as roofingshingles as well as stepping stones and outdoor floors.

Marble is produced with heat and pressure from limestone, which is another sedimentaryrock. Marble is a beautiful, shiny rock. It gives off brilliant colors. It is easy to carve so isoften used for statues, floors, countertops and monuments.

What is the story of coal? Think in millions of years ago. Heat and pressure changes softcoal into anthracite, which is a hard coal that burns cleaner and longer.

Think three hundred million years ago: there is a forest swamp Two hundred eighty million years and the plants die and sink to the bottom Two hundred twenty million years and a thick layer of peat, partly decayed plants,

build up. One hundred fifty million years and the swamp dries up. Buried under layers of

sediment, the peat changes to a sedimentary rock called lignite. Ten million years and the buried by more and more layers of sediment, the lignite

becomes more compacted. It forms bituminous coal. Present time you will find buried even deeper, bituminous coal is changed by great

heat and pressure. It forms anthracite, a metamorphic rock.

If you were picturing this swam and the layers of rocks under it, you could imagine that thelayers are undergoing constant change. When the rock was like a peat it would have been a different color and harness. The lignite is more like a light gray color followed by the softcoal being black. The hard coal is black and buried even deeper than the soft coal was.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students read about how rocks change under pressure and heat.

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Lesson 85 What do we find in our soil?

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Take some time to observe the Earth we come in contact with. Earth’s crust is made up of rocks and minerals. However, to get the rocks, you usuallyhave to dig through layers of soil.

Soil looks different at different places. It has different properties. Soil can be sandy. Itcan be moist.

Just what is soil? Make an observation. Write what you observe.

Answers will vary.

Use a hand lens to examine a sample of moist soil. What materials can you find? How do

their sizes compare. Write a definition. Answers will vary.

Look at two samples of soil. How do they compare? Answers will vary.

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Fill a cup half way with sane and another with moist soil. Pour a spoonful of water in eachat the same time.

Which absorbs more water? Why do you think this is so? Answers will vary.

What do you think makes up soil? How may the soil differ? Answers will vary.

With just a hand lens you can see that soil have many different materials. The mainingredient is weathered rock. Soil may contain water, air, bacteria and humus. Humus isdecayed plant or animal materials.

Where did the soil come from? The solidrock weathers into chunks. These chunksweather even more into smaller pieces. Living things die and decay to form humus.If you could dig down into the soil you wouldfind many different layers.

The top layers is the horizon and just underthat is layer B called the horizon B layermixed with sand and rocks. Below that ishorizon C with more rocks mixed with sand. Just under that is the bedrock. Thedifference between the top layer and thebedrock is the amount of solid rock and thetiny pieces of rock mixed with humus.

commons.wikimedia.org

Different locations of the Earth’s crust differ in layers of soil. Grasslands and forests havea thick layer of soil. A polar desert has no A horizon on the top.

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Sometimes the materials in soil match the bedrock below it. Sometimes it does not. Whydo you think that may be so? (The weather in that region should be considered).

Soil is Earth’s greatest treasure. Plants need soil to grow. All living things depend on soilfor food and survival. Farming is the most important uses of soil. All of the food we eatdepends on soil.

What is soil made up of?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students looked at different soils and discovered that humus added tosand makes a different consistence of soil.

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Lesson 86 How do we care for soil?

People depend on our soil. However,some people often get rid of garbageand hazardous wastes by burying themin soil. These things can poison oursoil and some even cause diseases. Spraying chemicals on soil affects thesoil. The chemical becomes part of theplant that people eat. Foam cups,plastic wrap and such material areoften tossed into the trash. Thesethings cannot decay and become of oursoil. They rain wastes. If these thingsbuild up it may makes the soilunusable.

All of these materials and more causepollution. Pollution means addingharmful substances to the Earth’s land,water or air. The substances are calledpollutants. When people causepollution, we say they pollute soil, airand water.

Some materials people manufacturecause a waste material that will notbiodegrade into humus. Things that

biodegrade, change back into nature. Plants die and decay and add valuable substancesback into the soil. Even crops that are removed from their growing soil cannot return theirnutrients to the soil. This can make the soil nutrient-poor soil.

Plants also keep the soil particles in place. They protect the soil so it cannot be blownaway or washed off. If plants are removed the soil is exposed to erosion by wind and rain.If you let cattle graze in the same area for a long time it is exposed soil. Cutting downforests exposes soil. As a result soil takes centuries to form a good base to re-grow thetrees.

Recycling waste material is helping us think about our Earth’s surface. Look for therecycle mark on the bottom of different materials and recycle. Many things are beingmanufactured from recycled material. This is better for our Earth.

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Farmers need to take care of their soil too. Some of the things they do is add fertilizersand humus after growing crops. Farmer use crop rotation where they change the cropthey grow in a particular area because different plants take and give different nutrients tothe soil. In strip farming strips of tightly growing grasses are grown between more widelyspaced crops. The grasses trap runoff and the soil it carries. Farmers also use contourplowing. They plow furrows across a slope rather than up and down a slope. In terracingplanting rows of trees to block the wind prevents soil from being blown away.

Think about what you have read.

What can prevent soil from being polluted or wasted?

Is there a way to throw less garbage away?

Be a soil conserver…recycle and think before throwing garbage away!

Lesson Wrap Up: Students realize that the soil can be a renewable resource if we takecare of it.

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Lesson 87 The Rock Cycle

Our soil is as healthy as our whole Earth is healthy. As the rocks give us our basic part ofour soil that feeds us. Without the rock there would be no soil. No soil means no foodfrom plants people or animals that eat the plants.

So let’s look back and think about what we learned about how rocks are formed. Theigneous rocks come from magma or lave. Sedimentary rock is made of broken up piecesof rock. Metamorphic rock is formed from other rocks.

All rocks are constantly changing from one rock into another. This is a constant process ofnever-ending series. There is a rock cycle. Part of this cycle is the weathering of rocksinto bits and pieces, which may eventually become our soil.

Rocks are constantly forming one changing into another. This takes a long time. We digup a deposit of sandstone or use up the coal, which cannot be replaced. Rocks arenonrenewable resources. People are designing man-made materials to take the place ofsome rocks. Concrete, porcelain and brick are all artificial rocks.

Take you plain piece of paper to draw and look at the rock cycle.

Cover your entire paper with one-third colored blue on the top to indicate the sky. The restof the paper would be colored a light brown indicating Earth.

Now with words written in a small square and arrows you can recreate the rock cycle.Draw five small squares along the bottom of the brown (earth) section of your paper. Color the first one on the left of your paper light blue and write: “changes due to heat andpressure”. Draw a blue arrow to metamorphic rock and an arrow back from themetamorphic rock.

On the next one to the right color it medium blue and write: “metamorphic rock” Draw anarrow to melting and an arrow from the top of the square to the surface of the Earth. The middle square colored pink and label it: “melting”. Draw an arrow to liquid rock square.Arrow to the right to the next square colored pink and label it: “liquid rock, magma, lava”. Draw an arrow to cooling square.

Arrow to the right to the last square colored pink and labeled: “cooling and crystallizing”Draw two squares above the far left square. Just above changes color the square brownand label this: “sedimentary rock”. Just above that one color it light brown and label it: “compaction, cementation”.

On the far right side of the chart just above cooling place one square colored red and labelit “igneous rock”.

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Arrows would follow this path: From the igneous rock a red arrow would go from thebottom of the square all the way past the squares on the bottom to the light blue onenamed changes due to heat and pressure. From the side of the red square an arrow goesover the top of two pink squares to the pink square labeled melting. On the top of the redsquare draw an arrow up to the surface of the Earth.

Thus the chart shows igneous rocks melting and changing due to heat and pressure. Metamorphic rock is under pressure and melting. Sedimentary rock is changed with heatand pressure.

Draw five squares along the top or surface of the Earth.

Color the one on the left light gray and label this: “dissolves in water; water evaporates”. Draw an arrow down to the brown square labeled sedimentary rock.

Color the other four squares a medium brown. Label the second to left square: “deposition”. Draw an arrow from the bottom of that one to compaction, cementation The middle square is labeled “carried away by erosion”. Draw an arrow from the top overto the gray square dissolves in water. Draw an arrow from the left over to depositionsquare.

The next square is labeled: “sediments”. Draw an arrow from its left to carried away byerosion.

The last square on this line is labeled: “exposure at Earth’s surface”.

Draw one more light brown square up in the sky, or air section of the graph. Label thissquare: “weathering”. Draw an arrow from the left of that square to the square labeledsediments. Draw an arrow up to weathering from Exposure at Earth’s surface.

When you finish this “map” of the rock cycle you will see where the rocks form and reform. So the rock is formed under the Earth’s surface but in time will become exposed to thesurface. With the weathering of the wind and rain drive the rocks back under the surfacewhere it may change because of the heat and pressure. A crack in the Earth may pushthe lava or magma back to the surface.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students drew and thought about the rock cycle.

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Lesson 87 The Rock Cycle

Name: ______________________________________________Date:______________

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Lesson 88 Review Quiz on Rocks

Name: _____________________________________________Date:______________

Prepare you paper for a science quiz. You teacher will let you know how much time youhave to review before beginning.

Complete each statement with the correct word from this word bank.

Fossil Solar systemErosionSedimentary rock

LithosphereGeologistOreIgneous rock

PlanetHydrosphere

1. The Sun and Planets are part of the solar system .

2. The Earth is a planet that orbits the Sun.

3. The lithosphere is the hard outer layer of Earth.

4. The oceans are part of Earth’s hydrosphere .

5. A (n) fossil is the imprint of a living thing from the past.

6. A scientist who studies Earth is called a geologist .

7. A solid material in Earth’s crust is affect by erosion .

8. Rocks that changes due to heat and pressure are called igneous rocks

9. Sedimentary rocks are made of small bits of matter joined together.

10. Ore is a mineral containing a useful substance.

Which of these are true? Circle the correct answer.

Compared to the Earth, the moon is unlivable because: it is too small OR there is no air to

breathe

The Earth’s thickest layer is called the mantle or crust?

Fossils may be found in lava or sedimentary rock?

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Igneous rock is formed from: meteorites that fell to the Earth or melted rock material that

cooled and hardened?

The main ingredient in soil is: weathered rock or bacteria?

Answer these questions in complete sentences or paragraphs.

Do you think there could be life on another planet in our solar system? Why or why not?Answers will vary.

What type of rock would have tiny seashells glued together, layers of different colors and

different size grains? How would you know that? Answers will vary.

What would be a good way to preserve the soil? What can you do to help? Answers will

vary.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students demonstrated their ability to recall and use the informationpresented about the Earth.

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Lesson 89 What else supports life on planet Earth?

Did you come up with the answer: wear sunscreen lotion? There is something that startsyour protection from the Sun long before the sunscreen.

You learned that the other planets of our Solar System would not be a good place forpeople to live. Why? You probably said because some planets are too close to the Sunand other too far away thus no heat. You may also have remembered that humans needair.

Air is more than just oxygen. It is a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen and a few traces othergases including water vapor. This mixture is vital for life to survive. It supports andprotects life on Earth.

Organisms on the Earth need oxygen. Living things have structures that enable them toget the oxygen they from the air. The water creatures take in air that is dissolved in thewater.

The process of taking in oxygen is called respiration. Oxygen is then used so that energycan be gotten from it. Part of the process is there is a waste produced which is carbondioxide.

With all these organisms giving off carbon dioxide why is the air not full of it? The plantsof the Earth need the carbon dioxide instead of the oxygen. They give off oxygen in theprocess of their respiration. Plants that have green substance chlorophyll take in carbondioxide. They use it to make food as you know.

These green plants can be as small as a one-cell algae plant. They replace oxygen in theatmosphere. This natural process makes oxygen a renewable resource. A renewableresource is one that can be replaced. It even can be replaced in a short period of time tosupport life on Earth.

Visualize this: An island with a tree, a burning little pit fire, a human, some dead wood anda person. There is water all around the island. The human breathes in oxygen from the air around him. He breathes carbon dioxide outinto the air. The burning fire is using oxygen and giving off carbon dioxide back into the airtoo.

The air takes the carbon dioxide to the tree. The tree gives back oxygen both to thehuman, animal and fire but also to the water.

The creatures of the water take in the oxygen and give back carbon dioxide that the algaeof the water give back oxygen to the air.

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Nature has its way of making life go round. There is a cycle for life.

Think of ways to ensure that our air is good to breath?

Lesson Wrap Up: Students look at and think about the cycle of oxygen in the air.

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Lesson 90 What is in the air besides oxygen?

Think about the atmosphere as a protective shield as well as a source of oxygen. Itprotects Earth’s surface from harmful energy that comes from the Sun. The atmospherehelps screen out harmful ultraviolet rays from the Sun. About eighteen miles above yourhead is a layer of gas called the ozone. The ozone layer screens out about nine-ninepercent of the Sun’s UV rays.

The atmosphere also shields Earth from rocks from outer space. Those things we callshooting stars are not stars. They are rocks from space that burn up because of frictionwith the air as they speed through the atmosphere.

The atmosphere also protects life from the possible extremes of temperature. Cloudsblock sunlight during the day. At night they keep much of the heat from escaping intospace so it does not cool off too much. When one area gets hotter than another, the airmoves. It circulates moving warm air up and cool air down. It spreads the heat around.Nitrogen is another ingredient in the atmosphere. It is very important in food. Aboutseventy-eight percent of the air is nitrogen. How does it get into our food? Nitrogen istaken from the air by bacteria. The bacteria change the nitrogen into a form that stays inthe soil.

Plants use this to make proteins. Living things eat the plants and pass the nitrogen along. It is returned to the soil when living things die.

Up-Warm Down-Cold

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Picture it this way: The cow is out eating the grass. The cow passes the digested foodonto the ground and the bacteria breaks it down. Some of that nitrogen goes back into thesoil and some into the air.

When living things die they decay leaving nitrogen return to the soil.

Think about it: What does the atmosphere provide for living things? Write about it.

Lesson Wrap Up: Students continued their understanding of how the atmosphereprotects the Earth.

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Lesson 91 Why are the trees yellow?

Do an observation. You need three cups, a piece of regular board chalk broken intopieces, vinegar, plastic wrap and rubber band.

Please the small pieces of chalk in each of the cups. Add a rock in each cup. Addenough vinegar to cover them. Take some plastic wrap to cover and cup and rubberband it on to keep the vinegar from evaporating.

Record what you see immediately. Now watch for several minutes and then later timesin the day. Record your observation.

Vinegar is a mild acid. How did it change the chalk? Do the rocks change in the sameway?

Many of the things humans do add pollution to the air. There are harmful solids, gases,and liquids in the air. Where do they come from?

What can destroy forests; kill animals and plants in lakes. It can even eat away atbuildings. Some comes from power plants that burn coal to produce energy. The othercomes from vehicles that burn gasoline.

The burning of these fuels creates waste that goes into the air. The waste mixes withmoisture. This forms chemicals called acids. This eventually falls to the Earth as acidrain. Moisture with acids falls as precipitation of rain, snow, hail and sleet.

Acid rain can harm soil and water. Trees turn yellow and die if there is too much acid inthe soil. Fish die when water in lakes contains too much acid. This acid weather evenaffects statues and buildings. It can cause metal surfaces on cars to crumble. Burning trash adds smoke to the air. Dust comes from plowed fields and constructionsites and mines. Factories add chemical waste to the air.

Pollutants get into the air from burning fossil fuels. These are fuels that were formedfrom the decay of ancient forms of life. Fossil fuels are nonrenewable resources. This means these fuels cannot be replaced in a lifetime.

Cars, buses, trucks, and planes burn these fuels. All the pollutants can build up intothick clouds called smog. Smog is a mixture of smoke and fog. Smog irritates theeyes, nose and throat. People with breathing problems have died from heavy smog.

Smog hangs like a brown cloud over many cities. Sometimes ozone can form in smog. Remember high up in the atmosphere ozone protects the Earth from UV radiation. Theground level gas can make people sick.

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What are five sources of air pollution?

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Lesson 92 How can we reduce pollution?

Satellites have taken photos of our atmosphere from outer space. They havedetermined that there are holes in our protective atmosphere. It seems humans havecaused holes to form in this layer. The holes are letting UV radiation through. How didthe holes get there?

Scientists are not totally sure. There is much evidence which points to substances thatpeople have been using. These are called CFCs, short for chlorofluorocarbons. Theyare gases used in refrigerators, freezers, and air conditioners. They are used in spraycans. When the CFCs leak out from products they rise into the atmosphere and canaffect the ozone layer.

CFCs have been banned worldwide. Aerosol spray cans now use substitutes. Cleaning up the air is a job that takes all nations. Congress passed laws to protect theair. It passed the Clean Air Act in 1967 and added parts in 1970, 1977 and 1990.Cars now have lowered amounts of harmful wastes they release. Clean coal methodswere introduced. Power plants burn coal that has sulfur removed. Sulfur can result inacid rain.

In 1970 the first Earth Day was celebrated. People are more concerned about thehealth of the atmosphere. The EPA, Environmental Protection Agency was formed in1970. It has the job of checking that laws are being followed.

Air pollution harms trees, lakes, and buildings. It can also affect you directly. Airpollution can make people sick. It can make your eyes and nose feel like they areburning. It can make your throat feel itchy and irritated.

Laws help to protect the air. It takes people to keep the laws and find ways to cut downon fuel usage.

Now you take the time to research the laws of the EPA.

Why is air important to living things? How does the atmosphere protect Earth?

How do people pollute the air?

What causes acid rain? How does it affect land and water?

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Lesson 93 Explore Water

Name:______________________________________________Date:______________

Experiment: What’s in water?

Hypothesis: Answer: What you think you will find…your guess. Your sentence wouldbe written like this: If…then, you fill in what would happen; what you think wouldhappen.

Materials: tea bag, deep pan, plastic cup, saucer, large, clear bowl or container, water

Procedure: Put a tea bag in a cup of water until the water is orange. Place a pan where there is strong sunlight if possible. Pour some tea water into the saucer. Put the saucer in the large, shallow pan Cover the saucer with a large bowl…clear if possible

Observation: Look at the bowl and pan several times during the day and the next daywithout picking up the bowl. Take notes in your science notebook about what you see.

Results: How was the water that collected in the bowl or pan different from the original

tea water?

Conclusion: What do you think caused the water to collect in the bowl or pan?

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How does this model represent what might happen to salt water, the water of Earth’s

oceans?

Take your experiment further and consider whether you could speed this process up

and if so how?

Is this a model of how ocean water can be turned into fresh water? Explain.

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Lesson 94Do we use ocean water?

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Lesson 95 The Water Cycle

The Water Cycle: The main source ofwater in the water cycle is the oceans. Every day trillions of liters of waterevaporate from the oceans.

Water also evaporates from rivers,lakes, and other sources on land. Plants give off water vapor as well.

Water vapor in the air cools andcondenses into tiny droplets. Bunchesof tiny droplets collect into clouds.

Water from clouds falls back to Earth’ssurface as precipitation. Rain andsnow are the main sources of freshwater on land.

When water reaches the ground, threethings happen to it. Some water seeps into the ground. Some runs downhill over thesurface. Some evaporates back into the air.

Now you see the water cycle. What is happening is water is constantly on the move. Itis a liquid to a gas. Water evaporates and leaves material it contains. The water vaporis not salt water.

When water falls back to Earth, where does it go? Some seeps in to the ground and iscalled groundwater. This seeps into the spaces between bits of rock and soil. Then the water starts to back up and fill the spaces in the soil and rocks above. The topof the water-filled spaces is called the water table. If the water table reaches above thesurface, a pond, a lake, or a stream forms.

Ponds and lakes are still bodies of water. They form where water fills up low-lyingplaces. Streams, however, flow downhill. As they flow, they join with other streams,becoming a river. Eventually rivers reach the oceans or other large bodies of water.

An underground layer of rock or soil that is filled with water is called an aquifer. Watercan move through an aquifer for great distances.

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Some groundwater seeps out of the ground in a spring. Springs occur where the watertable meets the surface. They feed water into streams and lakes long after it stopsraining.

People discovered long ago that if they dig down underground they could dig a well forthe source of water. Wells are holds dug below the water table. Water spouts up inthese wells because it is squeezed by the rock layers.

Most supplies of fresh water for large towns and cities come from reservoirs.Reservoirs are storage areas for freshwater supplies for people. They can be human-made or natural lakes or ponds. Pipelines transport the water from reservoirs.

Why is groundwater an important part of the water cycle?

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Lesson 96 How can people pollute water?

Our fresh water resource is being polluted by people, who are careless. It can bepolluted in many other ways too.

Precipitation such as rain or snow may pick up pollutants from the air. Some chemicalsin the air make the rain turn into an acid. Acid rain harms living things and property.

Fresh water also gets polluted as it runs off over the land. Water that runs over dumpedgarbage can end up in streams and lakes. In some cases garbage is dumped intorivers. As water soaks down through the soil, it can pick up chemicals, such as pesticides.Water used by industry gets polluted as it is used. For example, water that is used tohelp produce paper is filled with fibers and chemicals.

People can pollute water too. Every time a toilet is flushed, take a bath or brush teethor wash dishes or clothes water is polluted with wastes. Where do you think this waterends up?

Many families use water-treatment devices in their faucets. Some families have to usebottled water for cooking and drinking.

The question is can polluted water be cleaned. It can. The water cycle helps cleanwater. Remember that when water evaporates, it leaves behind materials it contained. The water vapor and eventually the rain that forms no longer contain those materials.

When water seeps into the ground, the ground acts as a fine screen or filter. Most dirtparticles in water are trapped or filtered out, as water seeps down through the ground. A well that is dug down deep in the ground collects water that has been filtered. Freshwater supplies for large areas can be cleaned on a large scale.

This is the process for water purification: Water is treated with chemicals that make tiny particles clump into big particlesthat sink to the bottom Water flows through layers of gravel and fine sand, which act as filters. Air may be bubbled through the water to improve the taste. Chlorine is added to kill bacteria. Some cities add fluoride to help preventcavities in teeth.

How can freshwater supplies be cleaned up?

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Lesson 97 More about our oceans

The Earth’s water is contained in large bodies of salt water called oceans. Examplesinclude the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean.

If all that water evaporated it would leave a layer of salt about 200 feet thick. The saltwould not be table salt. There are many other forms of salt. So where does table saltcome from? Rocks break down through weathering and their minerals flow intostreams. Those minerals end up in the ocean.

The other source is deep in the Earth. Volcanoes erupt and release gases and watervapor. The water vapor is a source of water but the gases include some of the saltsfound in the ocean.

If there is already salt in the ocean why doesn’t it get even saltier as this process isgoing on? The salt is removed as fast as it is added. Plants and animals use the salt tobuild shells and skeletons. Minerals also drop to the bottom of the ocean.

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The ocean floor is called the basin. The basin is as varied as any other earth’s surface. There are mountains, valleys and plains.

Seawater is an important source of minerals. As the sun heats the water it evaporatesand leaves the minerals behind to be used.

To get to the richer minerals of the ocean drilling is necessary. Oil, natural gas and coallie beneath the ocean floor.

The ocean’s living creatures are a valuable resource. People use fish, crabs and squidfor food. Some seaweed is also eaten. There is a product called carrageenan madefrom seaweed. It is used in toothpaste and even ice cream.

Use your imagination and draw a picture of what you think the floor of the ocean lookslike. You will read more about it and the terms used for the places under the ocean.Do you think the ocean waters can be affected by people?

Marine pollution has become a serious problem for the world’s oceans. Sewage andwaste from factories get introduced into all of our waterways. Ships spill oil or dumpsewage overboard. Ocean pollution can harm or kill marine animals and plants. It canbe dangerous for humans too.

Overfishing affects the balance of the fish population. The results are some types offish may become extinct.

Where do the oceans’ salts come from?

Write a paragraph about the resources we have from the oceans.

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Lesson 99 What are Ocean Currents?

The waters of our Earth are moving most of the time. The ocean waters move allaround the world. A current is a stream of water that flows through the ocean like thewaters of a river.

Some of the currents on the surface of the water is moved by wind. As the winds blowand cause the top layer of water in huge circular patterns. A current may move watermiles through the ocean.

Another thing that affects the movement of the ocean water is the rotation of the Earth. As it rotates it pulls great masses of water on the surface along with it. This causescurrents to bend to the right in the Northern Hemisphere and to the left in the SouthernHemisphere. The current starts flowing in huge circles. The surface current travels atabout 137 miles a day. Some currents are huge. A surface current can carry morewater than the Amazon River has.

The currents affect the Earth’s climate. California’s current carries cold water along theWest Coast helping it stay cool. On the East Coast, the Gulf Stream keeps the climatewarm. Deep-water currents move far beneath the ocean. They are set in motion bydifferences in temperature and saltiness of water.

By the poles of the Earth, water at the surface loses heat to the atmosphere. It mayalso become saltier as water is removed by evaporation or freezing. This colder, saltierwater is denser than the water below it. It slowly sinks toward the ocean bottom. Theless dense water flows in to replace it closer to the surface.

So, deep-water currents are set up. The water in a deep-water current moves muchslower than surface current. Dense water forms mainly in Antarctica and in the NorthAtlantic Ocean. From there the water sinks and spreads slowly outward toward theequator. The water may not resurface for hundreds of years.

Remember what you read and respond to this question in notebook.What are three ways an ocean current may form?

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Lesson 101 How heat is transmitted to our Earth

Where do you live? What seasons of the year do you experience? Why do we haveareas of the Earth have different temperature? Where are the warm temperatures foundall year long?

The answer is found in the angle of sunlight. Angles make a difference in how muchwarmth reaches the Earth with intensity. The largest part of the Earth is at the equator. That is the hottest part of the Earth.

The sun’s path is high overhead and hits the Earth at their strongest. The areas where thesunrays are not direct are at the top and bottom of the Earth. There the sun is much lowerat midday and less strong.

The angle at which the sunlight strikes the Earth is called the angle of isolation. Isolation isshort for incoming solar radiation. It means the amount of the Sun’s energy that reachesEarth at a given place and time.

Draw the following:

Draw a circle in the middle of the paper representing the sun. Draw half circles onthe far sides of the paper in line with the sun. Color this yellow.

The half circles will represent each side of the Earth when it rotates. Color the halfcircles blue.

Draw two sets of lines directly from the sun. One set should go to the center of theearth and the other set to the top of the earth on the right side of your paper. Thecenter represents the equator and the top the North Pole. This is how the sunraysstrike the surface at different angles as Earth travel around the sun. The right handearth represents December or winter in Northern Hemisphere.

Draw two sets of lines to the left of your paper. The centerline goes to the equatorand one set to the bottom of the earth representing the south pole. The earth onthe left side is June or summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

This will show the angle of the Sun’s rays hitting the earth.

The amount of warming depends on the angle of isolation. The greater the angle, thewarmer it gets. The angle of isolation is always smaller near the poles than near theequator. That means while it is freezing cold in one part of the world, it is hot in another.

Lesson Wrap Up: The angle that the Sun’s rays hit the Earth affect the seasons of theyear. It causes the seasons.

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Lesson 101 How heat is transmitted to our Earth

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_______________

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Lesson 102 Does the time of day affect heat?

Think about what we call isolation. The angle of isolation can be measured by examiningthe angles created by shadows. If you place a ruler or stick in the ground and watchwhere the ruler leaves it shadow during the day you will discover how isolation can bemeasured.

Take your plain paper and draw a quarter size circle up in the right hand corner of thepaper. Color it yellow and then draw a stick or ruler from the bottom of your paper about inthe center. Draw a line from the ruler to the left corner and label that: shadow of wall. This is where no sunlight will show because it will be blocked by the ruler or stick. Nowdraw about 10 lines evenly apart from the sun toward the ruler and past it where they passover the ruler to the bottom of the paper. All of the lines should be straight.

What happens when the Sun gets higher in the sky? How will this affect the temperature?Why do some things get hotter than others? Have you noticed how much cooler you feelwhen you wear a white shirt than when you wear black?

Dark colors get hotter than light colors. Texture is how smooth or rough a surface feels. Rough textures cause light to bounce around at many angles. Each time a little moreenergy is absorbed by the surface. Rough surfaces tend to get hotter in sunlight thansmooth surfaces.

Water is cooler than the soil in the summer. The light energy will heat land to a highertemperature than it will heat water.

Think: How do color and texture affect the amount of heat absorbed?

Lesson Wrap Up: The sunrays are measured by shadows. The texture and color ofmaterials affect the heat absorbed.

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Lesson 103 How is the air affected by sunlight?

Have you ever wanted to climb a mountain? As you move up the mountain, what do youthink is happening to the air around you? The temperature changes as you go higher. Climbing a mountain is a journey up in our atmosphere. Our atmosphere covers the Earthfrom the surface up to the edge of space.

Draw the following:

Color the bottom green for Earth with a person standing there and Mount Everesttoo. Now color that background a little less than one quarter of the way up blue.

Label this blue area: Troposphere and at the top of it write 8-18 KM for how highthat goes above the Earth’s surface.

The next layer should be colored a teal or blue green color and it should go aquarter of the way up above the Troposphere. This is to be labeled: Stratosphere;also write Ozone on the top of this layer. On the top write 50 KM for how high thislayer goes.

Layer three should be a lighter color blue green and be another quarter of the wayup. This would be labeled: Mesosphere and measures 80 KM above the Earth’ssurface.

The top quarter of the paper is colored light blue and is labeled: Thermosphere. Itis has ionized gas. This should be your top of the paper.

Most of our weather occurs in the troposphere, which is the lowest region of the lowestregion of the atmosphere between the earth’s surface and the tropopause.

The ozone layer in the stratosphere helps shield us from the Sun’s ultraviolet light. Theauroras, northern and southern lights, form in the ionized, electrically charged, gas in thethermosphere.

These layers surround the Earth like a huge shell or blanket. The layer closest to Earth’ssurface is the troposphere. This is about five-eleven miles thick. Most of the air existshere. All moisture is found and all clouds, rain snow and thunderstorms form. Airgradually gets thinner and is near empty above this layer. Temperature between layerschanges abruptly several times.

We experience air pressure on Earth. Air pressure is the force put on a given area by theweight of the air above it. Air is made up of a mixture of gases. These molecules aresmall and form nitrogen and oxygen.

The molecules have mass and therefore are attracted by Earth’s gravity and have weight. Normal air pressure is felt at sea level. As you go higher in the altitude, the weight of theair pressure becomes less.

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So if you climb a mountain you will experience a change in temperature and air pressurebecause you are moving above sea level. Lower altitudes have greater air pressure. If you are interested in the affects of air pressure on mountain climbers perhaps you couldresearch what do climber bring with them to survive on a high mountain climb and why.

Lesson Wrap up: The Earth issurrounded by layers ofdifferent types of air.

Temperature changes, as doesair pressure depending on howfar up you are above sea level.

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Lesson 104What causes weather?


Lesson 104What causes weather?

Name: ______________________________ Date: __________________________

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Lesson 105 Is there water in the air?

Name: ___________________________________________Date:_________________

Take a regular houseplant and place it in the sun. Cover and close tightly only the plantpart, not any of the soil.

Observe the plant several times a day.

Record your observations…what did you see change?

Describe what you see on the inside of the bag. Explain what happened?

This is called transpiration. It is much like the human body sweating. Plants’ roots absorbwater from the soil. The water is transported through the roots and stems to the leaves ofthe plant. The leaf gives off water in the form of what is called transpiration. This is thesecond largest source of water vapor in the atmosphere.

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Think about places and times you see something like this happen. What about when youmake a big glass pitcher of lemonade and add ice cubes? On a hot day there would bedroplets of water on the outside of the pitcher. This would drip into puddles. The waterdoes not come from the lemonade.

The water is from the air around the glass. When warm air touches the cold glass the aircools, droplets of water form, and run down to make puddles. The water in the air is watervapor or water in the form of a gas. It is colorless, invisible, odorless, and tasteless. Theamount of water vapor in the air is called humidity. Now humidity is not a droplet of liquidwater because you can see fog, rain or clouds.

The Earth’s surface is covered two thirds of the way with water in the form of rivers,oceans, and lakes. There is also ground water and water in plants. To get that water intothe air it must change forms.

The changing is called evaporation. This change takes energy. The main source of thisenergy is from the sun. Each day the Sun’s energy changes trillions of tons of water fromthe oceans into water vapor.

As the water heats the water molecules speed up their movement and evaporate into theatmosphere as water vapor. When the air is cooled, the molecules slow down. Themolecules collide and stick together changing them back into a liquid droplet. Condensation is the changing of a gas into a liquid. You can see the condensation onwindows, cold drink glasses and dew on the grass.

Now can you explain how water gets into the air?

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Lesson 106 A “bad” hair day!

A beautiful summer day feels like: the sun is shining but not too intense; the air is movinggently and is relatively dry. This is near perfect for me. If the angle of the sun is direct andtoo intense, my skin gets too hot too soon to be outside. If there is quite a bit of humiditythe air feels heavy and my skin will not be able to perspire enough to cool me. Whenthere is not movement of the air and it is stagnant, it feels like it is hard to breath.

What are the factors relating to water, that make our weather comfortable? Two factorsdetermine the amount of humidity in the air. First, there has to be water available toevaporate. Second, the warmer the temperature, the faster the water evaporates. Thismeans that if water is available, warm air will take on more water vapor.

Humidity and relative humidity describe the amount of water vapor in the air. Humidity isthe actual amount or mass of water vapor. Relative humidity describes the capacity forthe air to absorb water. If the relative humidity is 100% than there is no more room toabsorb more water vapor in the air. Relative humidity is a comparison between how muchwater vapor is in the air and how much the air could hold at a given temperature if it is notfully saturated.

When the air is dry it may be 25% relative humidity. If the air is saturated with water vaporit has a higher percentage of water vapor in it. This depends on the changes in theweather.

So your sticky days in the summer are when the humidity is high. Relative humidity canbe used to predict when condensation will occur. In the atmosphere, condensation isusually the results of warm air being cooled. The greater the relative humidity the morelikely condensation will occur and clouds and rain happen.

Now think it through: How does temperature affect relative humidity?

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Lesson 107 What do you see in a cloud?

Where would you expect to see clouds over the ocean or desert? Why? Since clouds aremade up of tiny water droplets or ice crystals, you would more likely to find them over theocean where there is water.

The cloud is formed by air filled with water vapor. The air is cooled and water vaporcondenses. The molecules clump together around dust and other particles in the air. They form droplets of water.

If you lay on the ground and look at the clouds in the sky you can imagine what things theyform. It depends on what the cloud is made up of as to what kinds of shapes they canform. Water droplets tend to produce sharp, well-defined edges. If cloud is very thick, itlook gray, or even black. That is because sunlight is unable to pass through this type ofcloud. Ice crystal clouds ten to have fuzzy, less distinct edges. They look whiter.

Clouds form in the troposphere. There are three basic types of cloud formations. Stratus clouds form in blanket like layers. Cumulus clouds are puffy clouds that appear torise up from a flat bottom. Cirrus clouds form at very high altitudes out of ice crystals andhave a wispy, featherlike shape. If rain or snow falls from a cloud the word nimbi ornimbus for “rain” are added to the cloud’s name.

Clouds also form at different layers of the air. There are low layer, middle layer and highlayer clouds and clouds of vertical development. Cumulonimbus clouds develop upward. These clouds bring thunderstorms. They can start as low clouds and reach up to thehighest clouds. If moist air is ground level cools, a cloud can form right there. A cloud atground level is called fog.

Now think about it: How are low, middle and high clouds different?

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Lesson 108 How about wind; what makes it blow?

Denser air exerts a higher pressure than less dense air. So you can see something likethat when you take a ball of clay. What happens when you take a ball of soft clay on atable and push down on it? The clay squishes out from under your fingers where thepressure is lower. Like that, denser clay flows toward less sense air. This flow of air iswind. Air that moves horizontally is called wind. Air that rises or sinks is an updraft or adowndraft. It is the warm air that flows upward and the cool air that drops down. How does air become more or less dense? As the Sun’s ray hit an area, they transferenergy to the air. This is when the air heats up. Now the air is less dense and it risesabove the cooler more dense air. This is an unequal heating and cooling pattern of risingair and sinking air and the wind called a convection cell. A convection cell is part of theatmosphere where air moves in a circular pattern.

An example of a convection cell is a breeze along a coastline. Sun warms the land and airaround it. The air rises and the cooler air from the ocean replaces it. A wind blows ontothe land. A wind that blows from the sea toward the land is a sea breeze. At night thereverse happens and the land cools more rapidly than the air over the water. A landbreeze blows from the land toward the water.

Convection cells also occur along mountains. As the Sun shines on a mountain during theday, the slope heats up faster than the valley below. Slope air wars and rises. The valleyair replaces the rising warm air creating a valley breeze blowing up the slope. Themountain breeze then blows down the slope.

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Lesson 108 How about wind; what makes it blow?

Name: _______________________________ Date: __________________________

Now think and respond: How are sea and land breezes produced?

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Lesson 109 Review lessons about air, wind and clouds

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Use these words to answer the first questions:

Barometer Cirrus cloudCondensationEvaporationHumidity

Land breezePrecipitationSea breezeStratus cloud

1. Rain, sleet and snow are kinds of ______________________________________

2. A _____________________________________________ measures air pressure.

3. Wind blowing from the ocean toward the land is called:______________________

4. Liquid changes directly to a gas by the process called:______________________

5. Wind blowing from the land toward the ocean is called:______________________

6. The process that turns water vapor into raindrops is called:___________________

7. A high, wispy cloud made of ice crystals is a:______________________________

8. The amount of water vapor in the air is called:_____________________________

9. A ___________________________________________forms in blanket like layers.

10. Weather takes place in the: mesosphere, troposphere or stratosphere

11. On a hot day, a lake is likely to be: cooler than land, same temperature as the

land or hotter than nearby land

12. Answer in a paragraph: Why do you need to be careful on hot days when the

relative humidity is high?

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13. What if there were no plants on the Earth. Do you think Earth would still get as

much rain as it does now? Write your ideas.

Good job! Watch your weather and check yourself on why the weather is what it is day today.

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Lesson 110 Weather Forecasting

Why is weather different in different parts of our country? If you have a globe your teacherhas directions for how arrows point out different major air masses. They come from thepoles and each of the ocean sides of our country. There are three tropical areas comingmainly from the southern hemisphere. There are polar air masses coming from the NorthPolar areas toward our country.

Where do you live? If you are in the western part of the United States near southernCalifornia, your weather is coming from the air mass called the maritime tropical and it iswarm, moist air. If you live in the northern mid section of the country your air mass is thecontinental polar air mass and is cold, dry air.

An air mass is a large region of atmosphere where the air has similar propertiesthroughout. Air over the Gulf of Mexico is above warm water. The water warms the air,and evaporation from the Gulf adds water vapor. The air becomes warm and moist. Airmasses are named for the region they come from.

Air masses move and bring their conditions with them. Once an air mass is formed, it ismoved by global winds. In the United States, global winds tend to move air masses fromwest to east.

Sometimes air masses meet. That means they run into each other. The air between thetwo masses does not mix. Instead a narrow boundary forms between them. This is calleda front. Weather changes rapidly at fronts. That is because you pass from one kind of airmass into another. Fronts often cause rainy, unsettled weather. There are several typesof fronts. You will learn more about the front in the next lesson.

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Lesson 111 What kinds of air fronts are there?

You may want to picture in your mind what is happening as the different air masses aredescribed.

In a cold front, cold air moves in under a warm air mass. Cold fronts often bring brief,heavy storms. There may be thunderstorms and strong winds. After the storm the skiesare usually clearer, and the weather is usually cooler and drier. In this case the stormturns to cool dry weather.

In a warm front, warm air moves in over a cold air mass. Warm fronts often bring light,steady rain or snow. The precipitation may last for days. Winds are usually light. Now wehave rain or snow coming. Warm fronts bring fog, stratus clouds that form near theground. Then the weather is usually warmer and more humid.

An occluded front occurs when a cold front and a warm front meet. There is a fastmoving cold front moving in on a warm front. There are two possible ways this may end.

In a cold-front occlusion, the air behind the front is cold. The air ahead of the warm front iscool. What is happening is that cold air is moving in on cook air and warm air is pushedup between them. The weather along this front will be like that produced by a cold front.

In warm-front occlusion, the air behind the incoming cold front is just cool, not cold. Theair in front of the warm front, however, might be cold. The weather will be more like thatproduced by a warm front.

When a cold and warm air mass meet and remain over an area for days is called astationary front. Stationary fronts usually have calm weather.

A warm front, warm air moves in over a cold air mass. Warm fronts often bring light,steady rain or snow. The precipitation may last for days. Winds are usually light. Now wehave rain or snow coming. In Warm fronts bring fog, stratus clouds that form near theground. Then the weather is usually warmer and more humid.

An occluded front occurs when a cold front and a warm front meet. There is a fast movingcold front moving in on a warm front. There are two possible ways this may end.

In a cold-front occlusion, the air behind the front is cold. The air ahead of the warm front iscool. What is happening is that cold air is moving in on cook air and warm air is pushedup between them. The weather along this front will be like that produced by a cold front.

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In warm-front occlusion, the air behind the incoming cold front is just cool, not cold. Theair in front of the warm front, however, might be cold. The weather will be more like thatproduced by a warm front.

When a cold and warm air mass meet and remain over an area for days is called astationary front. Stationary fronts usually have calm weather.

To review what you read: write a paragraph comparing a warm front with a cold front.

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Lesson 112 Thunderstorms in stages

Thunderstorms can cause great damage. It is a violent storm that forms under specialconditions. Often it forms out of another, more common kind of storm. Thunderstorms arethe most common kind of severe storm. They form in clouds calledthunderheads…cumulonimbus clouds. What happens is there are huge electric sparkscalled lightning?

The lightning heats the air and causes the noise called thunder.

The storm has heavy down pours of rain and strong winds. Some even produce hail. It begins with the air becoming heated. The intense heat causes air to rise very quickly. This forms a cloud as the upward rush of heated air happened. This is called updraft. Asmore warm moist air goes upward, the cloud grows bigger. Droplets of water and icecrystals keep growing in size. When the updrafts get too heavy it falls as rain or hail. Thisis the first stage of how a thunderstorm is formed.

Now that the rain has fallen, there is a downdraft in the cloud. First, updraft happens inthe cloud and now a downdraft. Air moves downward.

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The air going up rubs against air going down. Static electricity builds up. When there isenough build up, there is a huge spark known as our lightning.

If you picture this in your mind, you would see a cloud that reaches near the ground andgoes up into the sky. Inside there are plus and minus signs to represent the electriccharges. They move up and down and rub against each other causing lightning.Lightning is unpredictable. It can jump from the cloud to the ground or from the ground tothe cloud. It may even jump from cloud to cloud. It just takes seconds. Lightningsuperheats the air so the air expands. It slams into the air around it with force and makesa mighty sound; thunder.

The third stage is when the downdraft becomes stronger than the updraft. Heavy rainlightens up and stops. Most thunderstorms form in warm air ahead of a cold front. Coldair is dense and it moves under the warm, moist air. The warm air rises rapidly. Look outa thunderstorm may be on its way. The most likely time for a thunderstorm is when theweather is humid and a cold front approaches.

Review: In your science notebook, write a description of how a thunderstorm forms.

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Lesson 113 What is a hurricane?

Have you ever seen or been in ahurricane? What caused thathurricane? That is what we look atin this lesson.

Hurricanes usually form overplaces like the Gulf Coast. Theyare large, swirling storms with verylow pressure at their center. Theycan be experienced over tropicaloceans near the equator. Masses near the equator tend tobe very much alike. They formlots of thunderstorms. Picture this: Thunderstorms andrain with low-level winds flowinward. Draw arrows on yourpaper that flow upward. Now draw a circle three quartersof the way around your paper from

the arrows. Leave the center of the clouds open. Make red arrows from the right aroundto the left. Label the red arrows warm air. Also label the end of the arrow: direction orrotation of hurricane. From the center of the circle draw some arrows that come up to thetop of the cloud labeled upper-level winds; color them green.

Lastly draw arrows going down into the center of the cloud colored blue. Label thesearrows dry air sinking.

That is the picture of the process. Strong heating and lots of evaporation over the oceancan cause a large low-pressure center to form. Winds begin to blow in toward the low. Asthe rushing air nears the center, it moves upward and forms a ring of tall thunderstorms. Hurricanes can pick up about 20 billion tons of water in a day over an ocean. A force is put on the winds to spiral counterclockwise. Clusters of thunderstorms arepulled into the spiral. The thunderstorms merge forming a single large storm.

Water vapor is condensed and heat is released. The air is warmed. This decreases theair’s density and pressure. Moisture evaporating into the air decreases the air’s densityand pressure even more. Low air pressure favors more evaporation. This lowers thepressure even more.

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The lower the air pressure, the faster are the winds that blow in toward the center of thestorm. Winds can reach speeds of 75 miles per hour or higher.

As the moist air in the storm rises and cools, condensation takes place. The cloudsthicken. Heavy rains fall through the high winds. A hurricane has an eye at its center. The eye is an area of light winds and skies that are nearly clear.

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Lesson 113 What is a hurricane?

Name: ___________________________ Date: ______________________________

Think: How does lower and lower air pressure lead to the formation of a hurricane. Writethe process down as you can follow it.

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Lesson 114 What is a tornado?

A dangerous whirling wind moving across the ground in a narrow path could be a tornado. They are violent, dangerous storm. How can that happen? On a warm summer afternoonthe Earth’s surface is very warm. This can lead to a tornado. This is a sort of runawayconvection cell. Warm air rushes in to an updraft from all sides at a high speed. The air curves into a spin. As this happens, the air pressure lowers. This moves evenfaster in a spinning action. The tornado gets faster and faster. A funnel forms thattouches the ground.

In the center winds can reach speeds of 300 miles per hour. Everything in its path as itmoves across the ground can be destroyed. As the tornado moves across the ground it isunpredictable. It can change directions continually.

If you have a map of the United States, locate the states near the center. There are moretornadoes in the United States than anywhere else. Our Tornado Alley is located fromTexas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Florida to name some ofthe states.

The Midwest and the South are places where we have dry, cold air masses mixed withwarm, moist air masses. That is in the Great Plains region and the Mississippi Valley.Tornadoes are most likely to occur when there are big differences in the air masses. Thishappens most often in the spring and summer. When a tornado forms over water it iscalled a waterspout.

Answer the following questions in your science notebook:

Where is the pressure lowest in the tornado?

Which direction does the air spin in the tornado?

Where do tornadoes form?

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Lesson 115 How are storms tracked?

How would you know if there is a dangerous storm approaching? Storms are hard topredict. Weather persons use a special method. Most have Doppler radar. The wordradar stands for radio detection and ranging. Radar works by sending out radio wavesand recording their echo. The change in the signal from the original tells something aboutwhere it reflected.

Doppler radar looks at how the echoes have changed in frequency from the originalsignals. This gives clues about movement of the reflective surface. Doppler radar is avery good tool for scientists to track storms. The radio waves reflect off storm clouds andare picked back up again at the radar stations.

The scientists can report when something is moving toward or away from us. It can spotspinning motions of clouds too. Scientists use Doppler to follow and discoverthunderstorms, tornadoes, and hurricanes.

So if we listen to the news about our weather we should have an idea when there will besevere weather. But what do we do when there is severe weather?

First remember these terms:

Storm Watch: conditions are right for a storm

Storm Warning: a storm has been spotted and heading your way

Thunderstorm: Go inside; or stay inside a closed car Stay away from pipes, facets, electrical outlets and open windows Do not use the phone except in an emergency. Electricity can travel through it.Stay away from water. If in water, GET OUT. If outside, get away from tall things. Do not stay on a beach or open field, or ahilltop. Do not stand under a tree. Crouch down if in an open area away from metal objects including bikes. If your hair feels like it is standing on end, lightning may be about to strike. Crouchdown. Lean forward, and put your hands on your knees. Make yourself low to theground.

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Tornado: At home open the windows slightly and seek shelter. Stay away fromwindows and doors. Get to the lowest level such as storm cellar or basement. Stay under a table orsomething. Do not stay in a mobile home. If outdoors, lie face down in a ditch covering your head with your hands.

Hurricane: If warned board up homes and head for safer, inland area. Board or tape up windows and glass doors. If warned stock up on water and foods. Have flashlights ready with batteries.Homes on sturdy, high ground, you can stay in otherwise seek shelter Do not be fooled by the eye of the hurricane. Everything may be calm. Skies maybe fair for a short time, but the rest of the hurricane’s fury is right behind the eye.

Make a poster for each event with Safety reminders.

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Lesson 116Climate


Lesson 116Climate

Name: _____________________________ Date: ___________________________


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Lesson 117 The things that affect climate

Climate is affected by temperature and precipitation over a period of time. The latitudeis a measure of how far north or south a place is from the equator. The angle ofinsolation is different at different latitudes. So the temperatures are not the same. Youwill find the Tropical Zone near the equator. Here the rainfall is plentiful. For about 30degrees latitude in each hemisphere there are deserts and high temperatures and lowprecipitation. In the middle, summers are warm and winters are cool or cold. There isplenty of precipitation. This is the Temperate Zone. At the highest latitudes winters arelong and cold. Summers are short and warm. There is very low precipitation.

Wikimedia Commons

Look at the globe and you see water covering the globe. Land and water heat at differentrates. Land heats up faster in the sunlight than water does. Land then cools off faster. This affects the air temperature. Land is warmer in the summer and cooler in the winter.You know that wind patterns circle the globe. The winds blow continually above theEarth’s surface. They bring warm, moist air and they push air masses and fronts acrossthe country.

The winds also move water across the surface of the ocean. The ocean waters move, andwarm or cool air with it. Gulf Streams flows up the east coast with a warm current. Now the altitude of the Earth measure how high above sea level a place is. It is cooler onthe higher altitudes. This is measure from sea level.

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In mountainous places you may find tropical plants growing at the base of the mountain. As you travel up the mountain there may be pine forests. When you reach the peak of themountain you will find permanent ice and snow. It depends on how close the mountainrange is to water how much precipitation occurs.

The global wind patterns can force air up along the side of a mountain. Warm, moist airfrom the Pacific Ocean is blown up the side of the Sierra Nevada and the Cascades. Asthe air move up, there is precipitation on the windward side. The dry air descends downthe other side of the mountain. This side is to be in a rain shadow, they say.

Now think about it: What affects climate?

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Lesson 118 Sun's Energy

Think about a sponge. It starts dry. If you put it in a sink of water, the sponge absorbs thewater. When you squeeze the sponge, the water is released. So the Earth’s climatedepends on the Sun’s energy. The Earth is dependent on the heat energy given off by theSun. The Sun radiates heat into space. The Earth gains and loses that energy.

Radiative balance is when there is a balance of heat into the atmosphere and releaseswhat is not needed. The Earth’s average temperature remains the same. Too muchsunlight or too little can cause the temperature to rise or fall.

The atmosphere of the Earth plays an important part in this balance. Without anatmosphere the Earth would be like the Moon. Temperatures could be too hot or too cold.The Earth’s atmosphere works as a protective blanket. The clouds and dust in theatmosphere act to reflect or reflect the incoming sunlight. This sunlight, energy, goes backinto space. About fifteen to twenty percent of the energy from the sun is absorbed by theatmosphere. About half of the incoming sunlight reaches the surface of the Earth. Thiskeeps surface temperatures from rising much higher during the day. At night the heat iskept in the Earth warm. When the atmosphere is clear, the evening is cooler or cold.

How does the Earth hold the energy from the sun? The atmosphere keeps Earth warmerthan it would otherwise be. This is called the greenhouse effect. The atmosphere workssomething like the glass in a greenhouse. In a greenhouse a glass over a plant letssunlight in but does not let heat escape. Thus a warm environment encourages the plant’sgrowth.

The Earth’s greenhouse effect is caused by just a few gases. Under the glass you will findtiny parts of water vapor and carbon dioxide. There are other gases too such as methane,nitrous oxide and chlorofluorocarbons or CFCs.

So we have the Sun’s energy absorbed by the atmosphere. Some of the energy is lost tospace. Some of the energy does reach the Earth and is absorbed. The Earth’s energy isabsorbed by the atmosphere and is absorbed back from the atmosphere.

Now the greenhouse gases that are trapped in our atmosphere are caused by humanactivities. Think about just the exhaust from vehicles and industries. These are trapped inthe atmosphere. Scientists are examining and interpreting data in order to understand thegreenhouse effect.

Think about it: How does the greenhouse effect keep Earth from losing energy? Howwould that affect the atmosphere on Earth?

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Lesson 119 Health and climate!

What happens when the weather outside is very cold? How do you dress to outside? Why? Yes, we are warm-blooded animals and need to keep our body temperature around 98.6 degrees. So if it is below zero outside, your body can lose its heat.

Cold weather cools the surface of your body. Your body responds by circulating warmblood faster to keep you warm. Blood pressure increase and puts a strain on your heart.Proper clothing and shelter help you trap your own body heat and warm the air close toyour body. Clothes are made with materials that trap air between loose fibers. Your bodyheats the trapped the air surrounding your body.

In hot, dry climates, the health problem may be your body losing water. Now your bodybegins to sweat in hot weather. This sweat evaporates and cools your skin. If you do notdrink enough water, your body stops sweating. Now your body temperature will rise. Thiscan cause hyperthermia or overheating, which can be fatal.

Light-colored fabric can protect your skin and reflect the sunlight. Loose clothing lets aircirculate so sweat can evaporate and cool your body.

So in cold weather:

Protect your nose and ears on cold days.

Keep your hands, head and feet warm.

Dress in layers to trap your body’s heat.

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…in hot weather: Wear light-colored loose clothing to protect you from the sun and lets your skinbreathe. Wear a hat. Use sunscreen.

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Lesson 119 Health and climate!

Name: ______________________________ Date: ____________________________

Think and respond:

What is climate?

What are the main factors that describe the climate in your area?

What is the greenhouse effect?

Why is climate different in different parts of the Earth?

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Name: _______________________________________________Date:______________

Review Quiz on climate and weather: Use these words to complete the following sentences.

Air mass Warm frontClimateCold frontFront

TornadoThunderstormGreenhouse effectHurricane Storm surge

1. A(n)___________________________________________________may bring fog.

2. A dangerous storm that forms over warm ocean waters is a(n)________________.

3. The average weather pattern of a region is its _____________________________.

4. A storm often created in thunderstorms is a(n)_____________________________.

5. The _______________________________________may be making Earth warmer.

6. A great rise of sea level at a shore due to a hurricane is a(n)__________________.

7. A large region of the atmosphere in which the air has similar properties is

a(n)_______________________________________________________________.

8. A storm that produces lightning is a(n)___________________________________.

9. A boundary between air masses of different temperatures is called

a(n)______________________________________________________________.

10. A(n) ___________________forms when cold air moves in under a warm air mass.

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Which is correct? Circle the correct answer

Statistical weather forecasts are based on: the chance of a weather pattern

repeating it or the kinds of fronts moving out of an area.

Earth gets its heat from: greenhouses or the Sun.

When a cool air mass and a warm air mass meet and stay over an area for days

without moving, this is called a(n): warm front or stationary front.

A balance between energy lost and energy gained is called: radiative balance or the greenhouse effect.

A hurricane can cause sea level to rise because the air pressure under the

hurricane: is higher than normal or lower than normal.

Write a paragraph explaining safety rules to follow in a thunderstorm.

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Lesson 121 Spin it around yourself!

If you are riding along in a car with your eyes closed you may not notice the movement. Ifthe driver pushes on the pedal and speeds up very quickly you would feel like you werepushed back in your seat. If you have something to drink in your hand it may spill. Sometimes it happens when a car goes around a corner.

We recognize that acceleration as an unbalanced force and is an action. Unbalancedforces reveal their action by causing acceleration. It may be a change in speed ordirection or both.

All objects traveling at a constant speed in a circle experience an unbalanced force. It isdirected toward the center of the circle and acts constantly to change the direction of thecircling object.

Perhaps one day scientists will use the force felt by an object traveling in a circle toproduce artificial gravity in a space station. If the walkways were built around the rim andthe space station was made to spin, the floor would push on the passengers. Thepassengers would feel this push as weight.

Respond: How can you tell when forces are acting?

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Lesson 122 What are the properties of matter?

Everything around you is considered matter. The properties of matter are what describethe matter. Matter has mass and volume.

Mass is a measure of the amount of matter in an object. It is often measured in kilograms.Volume describes how much space the matter takes up. This is often measured inmilliliters. Liquid matter is measure with cylinders or beakers. Solid matter is measuredby multiplying its height times its length times its width. If the solid has an irregular shapeit may be measured by putting it in water to see how much liquid it displaces. Matter is defined using the properties of mass and volume. Matter is anything that hasmass and takes up space.

The weight is actually the force of gravity between the object and the Earth. To measureweight, use a quantity that describes the force of gravity between two masses. Scientistsprefer to use a quantity called the Newton to measure force. Newton’s and pounds bothdescribe the amount of pull or push a force produces. The force is the pull of gravity. Theweight of a piece of mass depends on where it is located in the universe. Should you beable to travel to the Moon your weight would be less than it is on the Earth because theMoon ha less mass.

With the two properties of mass and volume, matter can also be shown to have density. Density is found by dividing the mass by its volume. As long as the temperature does notchange, the density should stay the same. Each material can be identified by theirdensity. Lead has the density of 11.3 g per ml. Aluminum would have the density of 2.7 gper ml.

Lesson Wrap Up: Everything is matter. Matter has the property of mass and volume.

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Lesson 123 How fast does a mass move?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:_____________

Think about how a spring can move an object. Try this:

Take a washer or AAA battery and attach it to a metal ruler with a rubber band. Hold the metal ruler on the edge of a table and bend the ruler back. Pull it back about two inches and release it quickly. Count and record how many

swings the mass completes in ten seconds (use a stop watch). How will adding more mass to the end of the ruler affect how fast it swings back

and forth Record your prediction.

Add a second mass, and repeat the procedure. Repeat again.

Why does the ruler move the attached mass when it is pulled back and released?

What effect did increasing the mass have on how fast the mass was swung back and forthby the ruler?

Why do you think the increase in mass had this effect?

Make a graph of your results. What two variables should you plot…number of mass andthe distance traveled?

So estimate how many swings would be observed in ten seconds when four masses areattached to the ruler.

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Lesson 124 Race the cars...

What did you find out about the car and truck moving? Which one moves furthest? The smaller car would travel faster because objects with more mass are harder to set in motion than one with less. The car has less mass, so the push set it into more rapid motion. A pull or push acting on an object is called the force. It takes more force to move an object with more mass.

The tendency of an object to resist a change in its state of motion is called the object’s inertia. The mass of an object tends to make the object resist being set into motion. That is why larger objects are harder to move.

The famous Italian scientist Galileo began to understand how inertia affects the motion of objects. He believed that moving objects will stop eventually because of the force of friction. He created an experiment using two inclined planes which were facing each other. He observed that a ball rolls down one plane and up the opposite plane approximately to the same height it rolled down. He also observed when smoother (flatter) planes were used that the ball would roll up the opposite plane even closer to the original height. He concluded that any difference between the initial and final heights was due to friction. He believed if the friction could be eliminated, then the ball would reach the exact same height.

Regardless of the angle of the ramp, the final height was almost always, equal to the initial height of the ramp. He observed that pendulums swing back and forth to the same height. He reasoned that the ball would roll to the same height on nay ramp. He realized that if the ramp were less steep, the ball would roll a greater distance and slow down more gradually.

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Galileo inferred that if the second ramp or hill were flat, the ball would roll forever at a steady rate. This meant that the ball’s natural state of motion was coasting. Just as it takes a force to set an object in motion, it also takes a force to slow or stop a coasting object.

Roll a ball down an incline and see if it goes the same distance in the opposite direction.

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Lesson 125 Force is needed to maintain motion....

A sailboat will just sit in the water until the wind begins to blow against the sail. The windkeeps pushing and putting forth force. The water causes friction. Friction acts againstmoving objects. It opposes the motion of one object moving past another. If friction istaken away, no force is needed to maintain motion at a steady rate. An object’s inertia isall that is needed to keep it moving.

Sir Isaac Newton, a scientist, published a complete description of the concept of inertia. This is Newton’s first law of motion. It says:

Objects at rest remain at rest and objects traveling at a steady rate in astraight line continue that way until a force acts on them.

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This is why the spaceship keeps moving; there is no friction in outer space. Newton’s firstlaw of motion, the law of inertia, tells us that the state of motion of an object does notchange until a force is applied to it. That means, if an object is traveling at a steady rate ina straight line, it will continue to do so until a force is applied to it.

Newton’s law also means that if the object is sitting at rest, it will continue to be at rest untila force is applied to it. Cars traveling around a race track could not change their directionof travel without the force of the road surface pushing sideways against the tires. Think about Newton’s law. Try to think how that works in your world.

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Lesson 126 How fast are we going?

Have you ever asked the question: “When will we get there?” It is the thought on themind of many children when they are in a car traveling. How do you know you aremoving? Just sit back and look out the window of the car. You will see many things asyou pass by them. That means you and your car, are changing positions.

If you get lost while traveling you can check where you are by identifying the things aroundyou and look at a map. If you find the name of a city you can find that marked on the mapand decide where you are.

How soon you will arrive at your destination, you may calculate the distance and yourspeed. Speed is how fast the cars position is changing with time. When you know thedistance the speed is found by dividing the distance by the time.

The speed of a moving object taken together with its direction of travel gives the velocity. How do you determine the velocity of a car? You need to know the speed of the car. Which direction are you traveling?

Two objects can have the same speed but different velocity if they are traveling differentdirections. They also can be traveling in the same direction but with different speeds. Theonly way they could have the same velocity is if they are traveling in the same direction atthe same speed.

As long as the objects are traveling in a straight line and maintain their speed, the velocityis constant. Newton’s law states that an object’s velocity will remain constant unlessanother force is applied. What could that force be?

A change in velocity is called acceleration. Isaac Newton realized that applying a force toan object would overcome its inertia and change its velocity thus causing acceleration.The opposite of this would be to slow down or decelerate. If a speeding car was goingaround a race track and then a parachute opened on the back of the car, it woulddecelerate and stop.

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Reflect on these concepts. Take a couple of toy cars. Watch them move as you pushthem at the same time in the same direction. Provided they are the same size cars, theyshould move in a like manner. Gently put a marble on top of the car as it is moving and itshould slow and possibly stop.

Think of yourself getting on a ride at a fun park. Imagine it is a high-flying chair ride thatcircles around. As you move around in a circle you swing back and forth. What makesthe go faster? What causes the deceleration?

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Lesson 127Why do things stay in motion?

In the absence of forces, motion in a straight line and constant velocity continuesindefinitely. If you have a gas-powered model airplane you know it tends to fly in a straightline. However, motion in a circle requires forces to act. If you tie the plane to a string itwould force the airplane to follow the path of the string. The circular motion cause theplane to experience just the right amount of net force directed toward the center of thecircle or curve. It is steadily changing direction of travel which means that its velocity ischanging and that it is accelerating.

You can even think about this when considering the Earth and the Sun. Objects obey thelaws of motion in the same way. The pull of gravity between Earth and the Sun acts likethe string on a model plane. Gravity keeps Earth moving in a path around the Sun. Withno gravity, the Earth would move in a straight line out into the deep space.

Think and respond in your notebook: Ifa motorboat dies while it is traveling at ahigh speed, what would happen to theboat? Why?

Imagine a car speeding along on a rainyday and approaches a curve. His car doesnot make the curve. Which way does it goin and why?

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Lesson 128 Newton's Second and Third Laws

Place a six-inch piece ofmasking tape on the floor.

Put a block of wood oneach side of the starting linewith a rubber band stretchedbetween them.

Put a toy car in themiddle of the stretched rubberband and pull back about twoinches. Measure how far thecar traveled.

Repeat this two moretime and average the distancefor the three tries.

Predict what you thinkwould happen if you used tworubber bands instead of one.

Test your prediction outand record your findings.

When did the car more thefarthest when you used one ortwo rubber bands? Do you think the distance ofthe car was affected by how

hard the rubber band was pulled?

Place another toy car on top of the one you were using. Will the car travel as far as it didbefore? Why or why not?

Record the results in your science notebook.

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Lesson 129 What affects acceleration?

Pulling the rubber band to launch your toy car allowed the car to move in a straight line. As the car moved forward it begins to slow down and stops. Friction brings it to a stop. The farther the car traveled before stopping indicates it is going faster at the start.

Now if you tried the same action with two rubber bands you should have discovered thecar went further. Why? Because you applied more force to the car.

Sir Isaac Newton realized that forces produce acceleration. As force is applied anobject’s velocity will change. Remember, velocity is the speed of motion or operation. Itmay slow down, or change direction. It could even change both speed and direction.

Newton thought that if you multiply the force by a certain amount, you change theacceleration by the same amount. So if we triple the force the acceleration will triple also.Now if you taped another car on top of one, what did you find? You actually were doublingyour mass. The two cars traveling together will only go about half of the distance. Isaac Newton understood that changing the force is not the only factor in acceleration. Heunderstood that mass affects acceleration also. So if you increase mass you decreaseacceleration.

Thus the relationship to mass and acceleration are direct. When one goes up the othergoes down.

Write in your notebook: What two actors determine how great an object’s accelerationis?

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Lesson 130 What does the letter F stand for when considering

motion?

Think about a plane in the sky. It is flying at a constant speed in a constant direction. Thepilot is using the throttle to make the plane’s motor apply a forward force.

The plane’s motor is offset by other forces acting in the opposite direction. Like if you putyour two hands together and pushed with equal force. Neither hand will move passed theother as long as you push with the same force on each hand. So the plane is using theengine’s forward force to push against friction and air resistance. If you were in a windtunnel with a strong wind pushing against you, you could move through the tunnel as longas you can exert enough force to move your body against the wind. There are a numberof forces working against the plane but each one is cancelled out. When all of the forceson an object cancel one another out, the forces are balanced forces.

Now go back to pushing your two hands together. What if one of your hands only hadthree fingers? Will the force be the same from both sides? No, it would not and this iswhat is called unbalanced force. For the plane, an unbalance force might be if the motorof the plane give more force forward than the resistance of the air or friction. The frictionand air resistance will not cancel the forward movement. This will leave unbalancedforward force acting on the plane.

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Newton’s second law is sometimes referred to as the second most famous law of motion. This law says that the relationship between an object’s mass and how quickly itaccelerates depends on the force that acted on it: force = to the mass of the object timethe object’s acceleration (F = M x A or F = MA)

What Newton’s second law says is-If I hit a baseball with a small bat, the ball will accel-erate. If I apply a greater force to the ball next time, it will have greater acceleration and go farther than it did before.

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Lesson 131 What about rockets?

A rocket ship blasts offfrom the Earth when theengine’s combustionburns hot gasses. Theforce is now unbalanced. Like the balloon when itloses it air pushes theballoon in the oppositedirection so the rocket ismoved up from the blastof burning fuel.

Newton’s second law ofmotion helps incalculating theacceleration of the rocket. His formula is a = F/m. So if you know theunbalanced force and therocket’s mass, you cancalculate its acceleration.

When thinking about the balloon you come to realize the force that moved it was from the air inside the balloon being squeezed out. It is the squeezed rubber that forces the air out. So the force from the escaping air pushes the balloon. When the air comes out, there is no rubber surface on which to push. The push of the air forward is offset by anyrearward push. The result is an unbalance force.

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Lesson 131 What about rockets?

Name: ___________________________ Date: ____________________________

Now think and respond: What force makes a balloon rocket go forward?

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Lesson 132 Action vs. Reaction

Sir Isaac Newton understood that one object pushing on another will always receive apush in return. In the case of a balloon, the rubber of the balloon is stretched with air andreturns to it normal shape when the air is squeezed out.

When one object applies a force to asecond, we call this force the action. The force on the second object returnsto the first and is called the reaction. Iftwo children of the same size andweight pull on each other while skatingon ice they end up moving at the samespeed in the opposite directions. Therecome with the ideas of Newton’s thirdlaw of motion: For every action, there isan equal but opposite reaction.

What happens in a rocket engine? When the rocket is propelled up, the hot

gas expands and applies a force to the walls of the combustion chamber. The wall of thecombustion chamber applies a reaction force to the gas. The gas pushes the rocketahead while the combustion chamber pushes the gas to the rear and out through thebottom.

As one thing applies force to another, both feel force but in the opposite direction. If thetwo forces are not equal, both will accelerate. Go back to the two skaters. What if one ofthe persons was an adult and the other a small child? Both pull but the light-weight childwill move more quickly toward the adult. There would not be an equal force. Now if thetwo were on the ground and the child has tennis shoes on this would cause friction and itwould help the small child pull with greater force.

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Lesson 132 Action vs. Reaction

Name: __________________________ Date: _____________________________

Explain the difference between an action and a reaction.

What happens when one object exerts a force on another?

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Lesson 133 Spin it around yourself!

If you are riding along in a car with your eyes closed you may not notice the movement. Ifthe driver pushes on the pedal and speeds up very quickly you would feel like you werepushed back in your seat. If you have something to drink in your hand it may spill. Sometimes it happens when a car goes around a corner.

We recognize that acceleration as an unbalanced force is an action. Unbalanced forcesreveal their action by causing acceleration. It may be a change in speed or direction orboth.

All objects traveling at a constant speed in a circle experience an unbalanced force. It isdirected toward the center of the circle and acts constantly to change the direction of thecircling object.

Perhaps one day scientists will use the force felt by an object traveling in a circle toproduce artificial gravity in a space station. If the walkways were built around the rim andthe space station was made to spin, the floor would push on the passengers. Thepassengers would feel this push as weight.

Respond: How can you tell when forces are acting?

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Lesson 134 How do forces affect us?

There are forces working on us all the time everywhere. Newton’s law gives us anunderstanding of this fact. It helps us predict what will happen when forces are applied toobjects.

Think about going to a baseball game. The ball is thrown with force. The bat hits the balland sends it in the opposite direction. There is a fire and the firemen are using a hose toforce water out toward the fire. The water applies great force back on the hose. Thefiremen have to have quite a bit of strength to hold the hose and direct the water. If thehose gets loose, it will go flopping around on the ground as the water is coming out. A jetis taking off and the hot gases in the jet engines push it forward. The engines force thehot gases rearward.

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Lesson 134 How do forces affect us?

Name: ________________________________ Date: ________________________

What would it be like if a crew of boaters pulling with their oars moving a racing craftacross the water. What is happening there?

Now become a sport news reporter. Imagine you are interviewing a race-car driver. Youwant to find out about forces and acceleration. Ask what does it feel like to travel at highspeeds?

Write your interview for a sport magazine.

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Lesson 135 Why do things fall?

Name: ____________________________ Date: _____________________________

Predict: Which will fall faster; a golf ball or table tennis ball? Write you prediction in yournotebook

Procedure: Hold the table tennis ball in one hand and the golf ball in the other. Stretchyou arms straight out in front of yourself at the same level. At the same height, drop thetwo balls to the floor and listen for which one hits the floor first. Record your results.Repeat this procedure at least two more times to be sure your results are correct. Now trydropping a pencil or an eraser with one of the balls and record those results.

Record your observation. Which ball hit the ground first? When dropping other things which object hit the ground first the lighter or heavier object?

Explain why you got those results. Try this one too; two pieces of paper. One is balledup and the other is not. Drop them at the same time at the same distance. Which one ofthese hit the floor first? Explain those results.

Does weight affect how fast an object falls?

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Lesson 136 Does air make a difference?

What would air have to do with the fall of an object to the ground? If you dropped a ball and a feather at the same time, would they reach the ground at the same time? Why or why not?

Think, when the ball and the feather are dropped they must pass through air before hitting the ground. Air offers resistance to the motion of objects. The air gives more resistance to the feather than the ball. The ball will fall farther in the same amount of time because of this resistance working on the feather.

What if there was no air? There is no air on the moon. So if you drop the feather and the ball on the moon they would not fall at different rates. There is no air resistance. So the two objects would fall at the same rate of speed.

So with no air resistance weight will not affect the fall of an object. If an object is very compact there would be little air resistance and objects may fall at the same rate of speed even where there is air.

Galileo lived in the 1600’s and believed that objects fall at the same rate even if there is air resistance. He experimented with rolling marbles down ramps.

He talked about dropping two objects with different weights off a tall tower to see if they hit the ground at the same time. Galileo concluded that objects accelerate steadily as they fall and that they would hit the ground at the same time. So an objects weight (or mass) does not affect how fast it accelerates when falling.

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Today we know the pull to Earth by gravity is the force moving the objects toward Earth. Larger objects have more weight but also more inertia. Inertia is the resistance to a change in motion. So this resistance to motion offsets the greater pull of gravity on larger objects. So objects with greater mass fall with the same acceleration as less massive objects.

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Lesson 136 Does air make a difference?

Name: ___________________________ Date: _____________________________

Reflect:

How does air affect a falling object?

Why does a larger mass accelerate at the same speed as a smaller object?

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Lesson 137 What makes the apple fall off the tree?

There is a legend about Sir Isaac Newton. He is said to be sitting under an apple treewhen he got hit in the head by a falling apple. This gave him an idea. He thought theforce that pulls an apple to the ground is the same force that keeps the Moon in its orbitaround the Earth.

If you drop an apple from different heights you will find that it falls fastest from the highestpoint. As it falls it is accelerating. This means that it is acted on by an unbalanced force. The force acting on the falling apples is gravity. We give the force of gravity on an object aspecial name; weight.

The weight or mass of an object does not affect how fast it accelerates. Isaac Newtononce wrote, “I began to think of gravity extending to the orbit of the Moon.” He wondered ifthe gravity of Earth could be the force that holds the Moon in it orbit. Just like there is aforce between the apple and the Earth as between the Earth and the Moon. The force isstronger on objects is more on larger masses. However, the Moon is much further awayfrom the Earth than the apple falling from a tree. It is the same force.

Draw a round circle in the middle of the paper of blue representing the Earth. Draw acircle around the Earth representing the path the Moon takes around the Earth. Draw around circle on the path representing the moon. Add this information to your paper:

If there is no force pulling on the Moon, it would fly off into space. To stay on its path theMoon must accelerate around the Earth. The force pulling it inward causes theacceleration. So the Moon accelerates toward Earth. This is caused by gravity.

What causes things to fall toward the Earth?

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Lesson 138 How can gravity be “universal”?

Did you decide whether each of the planets of the Solar System has it own gravity? Doyou think their gravity is as strong as the Earth’s?

Sir Isaac Newton concluded that there is a pull on each planet. He also wrote that asmass (size) increases so does the strength of the gravity. He concluded when two objectsare close enough to each other they “pull” on each other due to gravity. Newton alsoreasoned that the larger the object the greater the pull. The pull between the objectsdecreases as distance between the objects increase.

Thinking about the moon, Sir Isaac Newton wondered about how gravity would changewith distance. This is the new law he came up with: Newton’s law of universal gravitation: The force of gravity between two objects increases with the mass of the objects anddecreases with the distance between them squared. Newton’s law did not just apply to themoon but to all objects.

Each of the objects in the Solar System has different masses and radii. Therefore; theforce of their gravity at their surfaces, vary. As the mass increase, surface gravity tends tobe stronger. But as the radius increases, surface gravity tends to weaken. Since gravityhas much to do with your body weight; do you wonder what you would weigh on anothersolar system object?

Here is a chart to show you the gravitational pull on different planets. It shows thecombined effect of the objects’ different masses and radii on surface gravity comparedwith Earth. You can find out your weight on the other planets by using the multiplier foreach of the planets.

OBJECT GRAVITY

SUN 28MOON 0.16MARS 0.38JUPITER 2.6SATURN 1.07NEPTUNE 1.1

An example of one multiplied would be an Astronaut on the Sun would weigh 7,000pounds. The same astronaut on Mars would weigh 95 pounds. Can you figure out whatyou would weigh?

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Lesson 139 Does it ever help to add weight to something?

Get set, ready, go! Imagine two ten year old boys that weigh 90 pounds each are on theirbikes and ready to race each other down a paved road. The only difference is one of themis riding an older bike that weigh 50 pounds and the other has a new bike weighing 30pounds. Who do you predict will win the race? Do you think it might be the lighter weightbike? You may be correct but it may not also like that.

Going up hill on an old bicycle would be difficult. The newer bike that is lightweight wouldbe easier to go up hill. The older one has more mass. Most older bicycles are made ofsteel. It is strong but heavy. Newer bicycles are built with steel alloys, titanium, aluminumor carbon fiber. All of these materials are much lighter.

In cycling, weight does offer certain advantages. The weight of the rider and bike pressesthe tires against the ground. Remember friction? This downward force increases frictionbetween the tire and the road. Without this the tires could not push on the road surface todrive the rider forward.

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Now, when would it be good to have some weight? When there are bicycle races thereare often curves in the track. The weight of each bike and rider presses into the trackthrough the tires. The track pushes back through the tires. If the rider goes around thecurve without enough weight, the bike and rider may go flying off the track. So pick yourbike according to the track for the race. Are there hills; are there curves?

Review: What causes objects to fall?

Why do objects with different masses fall at the same rate?

You will have a review quiz in your next lesson. Take some time to review your lessonsabout Sir Isaac Newton’s law.

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Lesson 140Reviewing gravity

Name: _____________________________________________Date: ________________

Review your notes and prepare for a quiz. Prepare for your quiz.

Choose the best word to complete each sentence. AccelerationWeightBalanced forcesVelocity Force

Unbalanced forceGravityReaction Inertia Speed

1. A push or pull that acts on an object is called a(n)__________________________.

2. An object’s tendency to resist a change in motion is its ______________________.

3. Pushes or pulls which completely cancel one another out are called ____________.

4. How fast the position of an object changes is its ___________________________.

5. How much an object weighs depends on its mass and the force of _____________.

6. An astronaut on the moon has the same mass as she did on Earth, but has less

_________________________________________________________________.

7. For every action, there is an equal but opposite ___________________________.

8. A change in a velocity in a certain amount of time is called ___________________.

9. An object’s speed in a certain direction is its ______________________________.

10. Pushes or pulls which are not cancelled by other pushes or pulls are

called____________________________________________________________.

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Choose the best word:

11. Gravity is a: weight or force

12. When object A exerts a force on object B, object B: doesn’t move or exerts a reaction

force on object A

13. A mass accelerates because: a force is acting on it or it has inertia

14. An object is accelerated when it is acted on by: an unbalanced force or velocity

15. A baseball and a sheet of paper are dropped at the same time from the same height.

If there is no air resistance: the baseball and the paper will land at the same time or the

baseball will land first

Think and respond:

Why do seat belts help protect passengers when a car stops quickly? What about

what happens?

Suppose you are on a merry-go-around holding a full cup of water. What happens

to the water as the merry-go-round speeds up?

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What do you think it would feel like to be weightless? Where can you be

weightless? Imagine you are on a space shuttle for the first time and you write a

letter to a friend to explain how it feels to be weightless. Describe how you feel and

what strange things happen.

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Lesson 141 What causes sound?

Name: ______________________________ Date: _______________________

Think about what makes sound:

1. Use a pen to poke a hole in the bottom of the cup. Cut the rubber band. Push oneend of the rubber band through the hole and knot it to hold firmly.

2. Tape the cup to the end of the ruler. Stretch the rubber band to the other end of the12 inch ruler and tape it securely.

3. Hold the cup next to your ear and pull on the rubber band and let it go. Record towhat you hear and see as you pluck the rubber band.

4. Hold the ruler with one finger on the rubber band keeping the rubber band againstthe ruler. Pluck it again. What happens?

5. From what you have done and observed, how can you explain what makes sound? 6. What happened when you held your finger against the rubber band?

Now that you have done this experiment; think more about how we hear sound. If you have ever heard a wind-up clock you may have heard it tick. If the clock were on atable and you put your hear on the table you would feel the ticking.

What do you think would happen if you filled a plastic bag with water and place the bagagainst the clock?

Do you think you would feel or hear the tick of the clock?

Now how could you hear the ticking best: through water, just air or through wood?

How do you think sound travels?

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Lesson 142 What is needed to make sound?

What is all around you when you hear sound? Sound produces waves. There are parts ofan ear that are moved when the wave of sound hits it. Since air is a mixture of gases, youmay conclude that sound can travel through gases. It travels as sound waves.

Can sound travel through solids and liquids? Put your ear on a table when you tap thetable. You hear the tapping. If you have someone tap the other end of the table evenlouder and you lift your head away from the table you can hear the tapping.

If you are swimming and your head is underwater, you can hear someone outside thewater calling you. You can also hear sounds in the water around you.

Sound waves can travel through all forms of matter. In fact, sound waves depend onmatter in order to travel away from the vibrating object that produces them. Withoutmatter, sound waves could not travel. No.

Respond to these questions in your notebook:

What is needed to make sound? What can sound travel through?’ Think: how do guitars and drums make sound?

EXTRA: Research how humans hear sound. How do people lose their sense of hearing?

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Lesson 143 What is pitch?

Do you like music? There are many guitars used in music. How do guitars producemusic?

If you have a few rubber bands of different sizes you can discover something about how aguitar makes a musical sound. If you pluck a rubber band you can produce a sound. Thatsound has a pitch. Pitch is the high or low sound. Pythagoras, a Greek mathematician,observed that a longer string produces a sound with a lower pitch than a shorter string. Try it.

A shorter string vibrates faster and produces a higher pitch. A second way you canchange the pitch is to stretch the rubber band tighter. Then the rubber band vibratesfaster and produces a higher pitch. The pitch of a vibrating string is also related to itsthickness.

If you could look at a guitar you would observe thinner and thicker strings. A thicker stringvibrates slower and produces a lower pitched sound. The thinner string vibrates fasterand produces a higher pitched sound. Guitar players press on the strings to make themshorter which changes the length of the string. There are tuning pegs at the end of theguitar to tighten the instruments strings or loosen them to sound differently.

You cannot actually see sound. There is an instrument called anoscilloscope that can picture thesound waves. Then you cancompare them. If the up and downlines of a sound wave is far apartthe sound is low pitched. If thewaves are close together it ispicturing a higher pitched soundwave.

This wave pattern is called thefrequency. Frequency is thenumber of times an object vibratesper second. Frequency describesvibrations and sound waves. Pitchdescribes how your brain interpretsa sound. A flute has a high pitch. A bass guitar has a low pitch. Frequency and pitch are related:

the higher and frequency, the higher the pitch; the lower the frequency, the lower the pitch.

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Frequency is measured in units called hertz. A frequency of one vibration per second isone hertz (Hz). Hertz comes from the name of Heinrich Hertz, a German physicist whostudied sound and radio waves.

You can hear 20 to 20,000 Hz. A higher number presents ultrasonic sound that cannot beheard by humans.

There is a lot of information in this lesson. Reread it and take notes in your notebook.

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Lesson 144 How do humans hear sound?

The busy bee is buzzingaround the beautiful rosebush. The cars have roaringengines and the washingmachine is rumbling. Atelevision set is blasting outyour favorite song. Soundsare all around us. How do wehear them? Sound produceswaves in the air that reachour ears.

You produce sound when youtalk. You have a larynx that is located in your throat. Ithas thin folds of tissue calledvocal cords. Air from yourlungs, rushes through the slitbetween the vocal cordsbegins to vibrate producingsound.

The vibration of air isproduced in other ways too. Bees vibrate their wings tomake the buzzing sound wehear. A tree crashing down isan action that creates sound.The air is filled with vibrationscoming from all directions.

When that vibrating sound wave hits your ear it enters your auditory canal. There is aneardrum, which vibrates tiny bones in your middle ear. These bones are called: thehammer, the anvil and the stirrup. There is fluid in your inner ear that vibrates. Thevibrating fluid sends a message, by way of your auditory nerve, to your brain. Your brainwill interpret the message so you can recognize what it is.

Air is the medium for the sound waves to travel. Other things that sound waves can travelthrough are solids and water. The Indians put their ear to the solid ground to hear ifhorses were coming.

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When there is too much sound and it is very loud, we say we have noise pollution. If thereis constant noise it is not good for us. It can cause headaches. This is when noise is uglybut sounds like music can be beautiful. Engineers work on producing environments thathelp filter out unwanted sounds to protect our ears.

Sounds can be reflected like when you hear an echo. Sound waves can also be bent orrefracted. There must be a medium, something for the sound waves to travel through, forthere to be sound. There is no sound in outer space.

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Lesson 144 How do humans hear sound?

Name: _________________________________ Date: __________________________

Circle the correct answer.

1. All sounds are produced by: people, water, or vibrations

2. Auditory means: music, noise pollution or having to do with sound

3. The larynx is located in: brain, ear, throat

4. Bones called hammer, anvil and stirrup are: part of the brain, parts of a trumpet or

parts of the ear

5. There is no sound in outer space because: there is no medium for it to travel

through, it is too near the sun, there is no electricity

6. An echo happens when: sound is very loud, sound is reflected, two people talk at

once

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Lesson 145 Sound volume

Energy is part of sound. A sound wave makes molecules of air vibrate. This back andforth distance of vibration is based on how energy is used to produce the sound. Themore energy the greater the distance the sound travels. The height of the wavesproduced is higher when they are loud.

So what is the difference between a whisper and yelling? It is the sound’s volume; howloud or soft it is. You can make a louder sound when you pluck a rubber band harder. The loud sound has more energy. It produces a taller wave.

If you connected two paper cups with a rubber band you can make sound. The cup andrubber band will vibrate each other. Together they make a louder than just the rubberband.

Volume is measured in units called decibels (dB) with an instrument called a decibelmeter.

Here is a chart of loudness in decibels:

Hearing limit 0 dBLeaves rustling 10Whisper 20Night sounds 30Soft radio 40Office 50Normal conversation 60Inside a car on a highway 70Busy city street 80Subway 90Siren 100Thunder 110Pain threshold 120Loud indoor rock concert 120Jet plane 140

This table gives loudness of sounds in common circumstances. Quiet sounds arebetween 30 dB and 50 dB. Moderate sounds begin at 50 dB. At 70 dB sounds are gettingloud. Above 110 dB sound is unbearable to hear.

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Lesson 145 Sound volume

Name: _________________________________________________Date:____________

Using the chart, answer these questions in your notebook.

1. How much louder is soft radio than your house at night? An office than a house atnight?

2. How much softer is normal conversation than thunder?

3. You make a chart listing loud sounds in your environment. How can you protectyour ears from harm?

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Lesson 146 Good Sound

How would you explain sound to someone? What if the person was a deaf person? Would your answer change? It is difficult to describe something you cannot see.

Sound is not just something you hear. It is a kind of energy. Energy can do work and socan sound. It can make things happen. Sound moves from one place to another in theform of vibrations. These vibrations are how we can sense that a sound has been made.Vibrations move through air, or other material, like waves in an ocean. As the vibrationsmove they transfer their energy to other things. When that happens it becomes somethingyou can see or feel. An opera star can sing a very high loud sound that can force theenergy from the vibrations to actually break glass!

Your inside can feel the vibrations of a large drum. If you are close to the drum you seethe top vibrate and almost feel like your stomach is dancing to the beat of the music. Youcan see the sound too if you know where to look.

If you have a glass of water in a room and someone is banging a big drum, you may seesound waves move through the water. If the drum is played very loudly, what may happento the water in the glass? Can you see and feel sound? If something has energy, can itmake something happen? What is similar to the waves of an ocean?

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Lesson 146 Good Sound

Name: _____________________________________________Date:________________

Fill in the blanks

SomeoneExplainSomethingEnergy

AnotherFeelPlaceThese

If __________________asked you to _____________________what sound was,

what would you tell them?

Sound is a kind of energy. That means it can do__________________________.

Sound moves from ____________to _________________in the form of vibrations.

_________________vibrations are how we can ______________that a sound has

been made.

As the vibrations move, they transfer their _____________________to other things.

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Lesson 147 How do you record sound?


Lesson 147 How do you record sound?

Name: ______________________________ Date: ___________________________

RESPOND

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Lesson 148 What materials are the best reflectors of sound?

Gather your materials, sound maker and 2 long cardboard or paper tubes. The materialsshould have a variety of texture like hard, smooth and soft.

You will place one of the objects on a table. Set up your tubes in a V-shaped pattern onthe table. The V should meet at the object you are testing. You will record the name ofthe object.

Observe: Place a sound maker at one end of the V. Listen for ticking at the other end ofthe V. Rank the loudness of the ticking on a scale of 1 (lowest) to 5 (highest). Record thenumber after listening carefully.

Repeat these steps with the different materials you collected.

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Lesson 148 What materials are the best reflectors of sound?

Name:___________________________________________Date:___________________ Classify: What types of material were the best reflectors of sound? Were they smooth,

hard or soft? What kind is the best absorber?

Draw a diagram of the path of sound from the sound maker to your ear. On your diagram,mark the point in the path where the sound wave bounced.

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What did you learn today?

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Lesson 149 Bounce or reflect?

Did you discover that hard, smooth surfaces reflect sound better than a soft texture? So ifyou hit a towel and then a metal sheet you would recognize a huge difference in the soundbecause the sound wave does not act the same way.

When a sound wave hits a surface, some of its energy bounces off the surface. Thebouncing of a sound wave off a surface is called reflection. However, some wave’s energyenters the surface and part of the sound disappears. The disappearance of a sound waveinto a surface is called absorption.

Sound energy can be absorbed. Its energy is changed into heat energy. Then other timesnot all of the energy is absorbed. Part of the energy may travel through a surface andcome out the other side. Think about putting your ear to a wall and hearing sounds fromthe other room.

How much of the sound wave’s energy is reflected or absorbed depends on the kind ofmaterial of the surface. When sound waves hit a hard, smooth surface such as the wallaround the racetrack, much of the sound wave’s energy is reflected. However, whensound waves hit a soft, textured surface such as a towel, less of the sound wave’s energyis reflected and more is absorbed.

Now if you wanted to design a concert hall you would be very interested in how sound isheard. Engineering such a place means knowing which material does what. Rugs on thefloor will keep walking and feet quiet. Padded seat will absorb another people sounds. Now hearing the music as it is meant to be heard is tricky. There was a concert hall builtcalled the London Music hall. It was built in 1871. At that time it was known as the bestplace in the world to hear music. By the 1930s listeners complained that the music did notsound good. Sound engineers were confused. The hall was the same.

After many investigations, the engineers came up with what had changed. It was not thehall; it was the audience. In the 1800s the women wore huge long billowing layeredsound-absorbing gowns to the concert. The new styles of the 1900s did not absorb soundas well. Overall they changed the balance of reflection and absorption of sound in theroom.

Do more sound waves bounce from hard, smooth surfaces or soft, textured surfaces?

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Lesson 150 Speed of Sound

Hello…hello! Listening to you voice come back at you is fun. How does that happen? Asyour vocal cords make sound waves they travel away from you in all directions. If thesound waves hit a surface, some of the sound wave’s energy will reflect off the surfaceand travel back to you. A reflected sound wave is called an echo. If there is more thanone surface to reflect off you will hear your voice come back at you more than one time. A shower is a great place to have your voice echo. There you have hard, smooth walls. The sounds go back and forth off the walls. Your voice will sound rich and mellow.

Just how fast does sound travel? An echo takes almost no time at all to bounce back atyou. Sound waves travel very fast. In a room that is warm, the sound waves can travelabout 343 meters per second. That is faster than most jet planes travel. The medium thatthe sound waves hit or go through make a difference in the speed of the sound.

Sound will travel faster in a solid than in a liquid. It is faster in liquid than a gas. Whatmust be considered is how tightly the molecules of the medium are packed. Thetemperature will affect the speed of sound. Temperature is most important whenconsidering how fast sound goes through gas than in liquids and solids.

What do you think: Will sound travel faster through air or steel?

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Lesson 150 Speed of Sound

Name: ________________________________ Date: _________________________

Here are a few materials and how fast sound travels through them:

Stone 5,971 meter per secondAluminum 5,000 m/s Seawater at 25 degrees C 1,531 m/s Water at 25 degrees C 1,498 m/s Air at 25 degrees C 346 m/s

Of these things: which material does sound travel slowest?

How are echoes made?

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Lesson 151 How does sonar work?

You have learned that an echo iswhen sound hits something andbounces back. Your ears pick upthe sound waves and you hearyour own voice just seconds afteryou made the sound.

Sonar stands for sound navigation ranging. Sonar usesthe way sounds bounce back, orreflect, off objects. A sonardevice can be active or passive. Passive sonar just listens forsounds and uses them to find thedistance and location of objects.Sonar has many uses. Passivesonar is used by the navy to findships and submarines. Scientistsuse it to find whales or otheranimals in the sea they want tostudy. While active sonar is used

to measure distance with sound. When sound hits an object, some of the sound wavesare reflected back to the device. The distance to the object can be found from the time ittakes for the sound to travel to the object and back.

A passive sonar device collects sound made by an object. It can find the direction inwhich the object is moving. It is not useful to find the distance to the object. Submarinesuse passive sonar to avoid being heard. Active sonar is used to map the bottoms ofoceans and lakes. Fishermen use active sonar to find fish.

Whales, dolphins, and bats use a form of natural sonar called echolocation. They sendout sound waves and listen for the echo. Their brains use the echo to find food or theirfamilies and to find their way. These animals use sound to “see” what is around them.Bats are able to live in dark caves because they use a form of echolocation rather thansight to navigate. Bats send out high-pitched squeals and clicks into the air at their prey. Their large, forward pointing ears pick up the echoes. Using this information, bats canclose in on their prey.

The pitch of an echo and the original sound are the same. Have you ever heard a policecoming behind you with its siren on? If you may have noticed the pitch is higher when thecar is behind you, and lowers the pitch as the car passes you.


As the car was coming, the waves of the sound crowd together. As the car moves beyondyou the waves spread apart. Then your ears only hear some of the sound. The pitch ofthe siren is lower than.

The change in frequency and pitch as a source of sound moves toward or away from youis known as the Doppler Effect. It is named for a 19th century scientist named ChristianJohann Doppler who first described it.

Many radar (radio detection and ranging) devices use the effect to find the speed ofobjects. Patrol cars detect changes in frequency as a way of detecting speeding vehicles.


Lesson 151How does sonar work?

Name: _______________________________________________Date:______________

Now check your memory:1. What do the letter of sonar stand for?

2. Sonar is like an echo because…

3. How would you describe echolocation?

4. Sonar or echolocation helps animals do what?

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Lesson 152 How can you tell the difference in voices?

How do we tell the difference in voices? What if two people sin the same note at the samepitch at the same loudness? You probably would be able to recognize the differencebetween the two voices. The quality of the sound is what makes it different from anothersound of the same loudness and pitch. Quality makes a sound unique. The qualitydepends on the vibrations that produce the sound. When a string vibrates it vibrates atmore than one frequency at a time. The whole string vibrates at the fundamentalfrequency, the lowest frequency at which it vibrates.

At exactly the same time the sections of the string are vibrating at a higher frequencycalled overtones. Each of the overtones has a different pitch. It is the blend of thefundamental frequencies and the overtones produced that gives each sound its ownquality.

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Each sound, whether it is a voice or musical instrument, whether produced by a vibratingstring or column of air is different from all other sounds. Each sound has its own blend offundamental frequency and overtones that allows you to identify it.

What do buildings and bridges have in common with musical instruments? Each has itsown natural frequency of vibration. If a vibrating force shakes them at their naturalfrequency, the vibration builds up. This buildup results in a condition called resonance. Resonance can make a violin or trumpet sound louder. However, resonance can alsocause great damage to buildings and bridges, making them rattle and sway. Bridges havecollapsed as a result of resonance.

So hear your voice as other do. Tape record your voice and listen to it. Does it sounddifferently than when you are just speaking? Do you know why? Because when youproduce a sound it resonates in your head as well as hearing it from your ears. When youhear your voice on the tape recorder you are hearing your voice quality as others hearyou. Surprised?

Can you explain how the same note played on two different instruments at about the sameloudness sound different?

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Lesson 152 How can you tell the difference in voices?

Name: _________________________________ Date: _________________________

Write a paragraph: Does sound travel with the same speed through all materials?

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Lesson 153 Review and Remember

Name: _______________________________________________Date:______________

Use these words for the answers of these statements:

AbsorptionVibrationCompressionDecibelSound waveEcho

ReflectionHertzRarefactionQuality

1. When molecules spread apart, that’s the _______________ stage of a sound wave.

2. The unit for measuring frequency is a(n)__________________________________.

3. When molecules bunch together, that’s the _____________ stage of a sound wave.

4. A sound starts with a (n) _____________________________________________.

5. A sound travels as a (n) _____________________________________________.

6. A reflected sound is called a(n)________________________________________.

7. An echo is caused by a (n) ___________________________________________.

8. Overtones affect the _______________________________________ of a sound.

9. Loudness is measured in a unit called a(n)_______________________________.

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10. Sound tends not to bounce off carpets because of ________________________.

Circle the best answer:

If the frequency of a musical note is increased…the note gets louder or higher

Echoes are the result of…absorption or reflection

The two parts of a sound wave are…compression and rarefaction or overtone and

resonance

The changing pitch of a moving siren is caused by…absorption or the Doppler effect

Two differences we hear in sounds are…pitch and quality or absorption and rarefaction

Respond:

Do people learn better if they listen to Mozart’s music than if they listen to rockmusic? Write a design for an experiment that would test this.

Or…Write a paragraph explaining how the a violin and a trumpet are builtdifferently to produce different sounds.

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Lesson 154 Can you see without light?

Does the moon give out light on its own? What do you think? I know you can see themoon sometimes and others it is difficult to see. What you are actually seeing is thereflection of sunlight on the moon. The sunlight bounces off the Moon’s surface and intoour eyes. The dark side of the Moon is not lit by the Sun. Since the sunlight does notreach that side of the Moon we cannot see it.

So what is light? Scientists know it is not matter, as we know matter. It does not takespace and it has no mass. Light, like sound, is means of transferring energy betweenpoints.

List is a form of energy. All objects we can see are reflecting light. The source of that lightmay be the Sun or a light bulb. Heat is involved in light energy. Nuclear reactions heatthe Sun. Chemical reactions heat a burner flame. Electricity heats the glowing wire of alight bulb.

The hotter the material the faster the molecules are moving. The molecules collide andsome energy from the collision may be given off as light. At times the moleculesthemselves vibrate and give off light waves.

Light sources give off one kind of light energy. The Sun energy is nuclear energy. Aburner makes light from chemical energy. The electric light bulb makes light fromelectrical energy. The light energy given off by these sources, carry the energy away atgreat speed.

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Lesson 154 Can you see without light?

Name: ______________________________________________Date:______________

Who invented the light bulb? Look that answer up and find who, when and what the firstlight bulb looked like. Write a report on what you find out.

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Lesson 155 How does light travel?

What happened when you pointed the lightfrom a flashlight? If you looked carefullyyou would have noticed the light wentdirectly to the object. Behind the object lefta shadow behind the object. This mightsuggest that light always travels in straightlines. However, this is true only when asubstance like air or water remains thesame along the whole pathway of light.Light usually changes direction when itpasses from one substance into another. Otherwise, as long as light travels throughair or water, it follows a straight line.

Actually, light travels as a series of waves. These waves can be disturbed or bentwhen they travel past the edge of a thinobject or flow through a very narrowopening.

If we could follow a point on a light waveas it ripples outward from its source, wewould trace a straight line. This beam oflight is called a light ray.

Light rays bend as they pass through a thin object or a very tiny hole. Each small sectionof a light wave follows a straight path, creating a ray of light. When a flashlight is on,electric currents from the batteries flow through the metal strip and lights the bulb. Now turn your flashlight on again and look at the light ray. Is the path of the light straight?

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Lesson 156 How does a mirror reflect light?

All objects that are seen must give off its own light or reflect light. Light reflects orbounces off objects using light rays.

Now how about the mirror? Does it produce its own light or reflect light? When you lookinto a mirror where you can see yourself, where did the light come from? Light rays reflectoff rough surfaces in a scatter direction. Light rays on a flat polished surface reflect lightrays and create an image.

The angle between an incoming light ray and a surface equals the angle between thereflected light ray and the surface. This is called the law of reflection.

An image is created by a light source hitting a polished shiny surface. The things you seewhen you look in a flat mirror look very real. Your experience tells you they are not real;just an image of the real thing.

A basketball shows what a light ray does when it reflects off a surface. The anglesbetween the path of the ball and the floor are equal on either side of the bounce. Ambulance signs are often done in “mirror writing” so that they can be read correctly whenseen in a rearview mirror of a vehicle.

Now think about what you experienced and read. Answer in your notebook:

How does light bounce off a mirror?

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Lesson 157 Can we curve the light rays?

Mirrors that curve in on the shiny side are concave mirrors, while mirrors that curve out on the shiny side are convex mirrors. Curved mirrors form images that are different from those formed by flat mirrors, much like the shiny hard surfaces of the spoons.

How do you think the images on these curved mirrors would be different from the flat mir-ror image? If you can see your image in the spoon, did you look different? Your image may look different depending on how far away you are.

The inside of the spoon acts like a concave mirror while the backside of the spoon is similar to a convex mirror.

The convex mirror produce reduced upright images. The concave mirror forms different types of images depending on the position of the object in relation to the mirror.

Concave mirrors are used in telescopes. The images can be case on film or light detec-tors for study. Objects very close to a concave mirror produce enlarged, right-side-up images. If the object is farther back it becomes enlarged and upside-down. As the object moves farther away from the mirror the image remains upside-down but gets smaller.

If you can draw a picture of what happens you might think of the candle in front of a shiny curved frying pan. The light ray from the top of the candle would come directly from the candle to the bottom of the frying pan and bounce back to the bottom of the candle. The object thus looks upside down. The light rays into the pan and back to the candle are straight but on an angle top to bottom thus producing an upside image.

Think: How are images formed by curved mirrors different from those of flat mirrors?

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Lesson 158 Mirror, mirror on the Wall..........

Have you ever seen a big round curved mirror in a store? They are often placed up nearthe ceiling facing down. The image they reflect are the people walking near or around it. These mirrors are convex mirrors and are curved like part of the outside of a sphere. Theimage it produces is right-side up and much smaller than the object. Convex mirrors areused as side rearview mirrors on cars. They are capable of giving a wide-angle view. Thecar mirrors give a image that seems to be farther away than they really are. Convexmirrors are used in stores as security to give a wide view of what is going on in the store.

Mirrors are used for other things too. If you go to a parade and are too short to see overthe people in front of you there is a solution. You could use a periscope. Yes, aperiscope. You use tall tubes with mirrors inside to see over the tall people in front of you. Periscopes are used in submarines to allow the subs to stay underwater while getting alook at what is going on above the water’s surface.

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Lesson 158 Mirror, mirror on the Wall..........

Name: ______________________________ Date: ___________________________

Now think more about light waves:

What evidence can you give that light travels in straight lines?

How are the images formed by concave mirrors different from those formed by convexmirrors?

Have ever been to a “fun house”? There are mirrors in them. What kind of mirrors wouldyou use and why? It fun to see yourself tall and moving in strange shapes!

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Lesson 159 Look at the time line of the light bulb

It was a bright idea! How did the early American’s see at night? That is correct they used candles and oil lamps. It worked but wasnot too bright. It was in the 1800’s that Alessandro Volta producedthe first steady electric current. In 1820 an inventor put a currentthrough a metal wire. He saw a glow and put that into a closedglass container. This was the first light bulb.

In 1841 someone built the first light with glowing carbon. Otherinventors used other kinds of filaments or thin materials that glowwhen electrified. The United States first popular light bulb had acarbon filament. It was invented by Thomas Edison in 1879. It wasbut two years later that Howard Latimer patented an improved bulbwith a carbon filament. He later worked with Thomas Edison.

In 1902 metal-filament light bulbs were for sale. They were very expensive. The GeneralElectric Corporation set up a laboratory to create new bulbs. It was 1910 that theydiscovered how to make inexpensive, bright bulbs with tungsten filaments. However,black material coated the inside of these bulbs dimming the light.

Scientist Irving Langmuir found that by filling the bulbs with a special gas, they would notturn black. So by 1934 he had learned that coiling the filament made the light brighter. Fluorescent light bulbs were also produced in the 1930’s. They use light from a glowinggas to make a coating inside the bubs glow. Fluorescent lights use less electricity and arecooler than ordinary bulbs. In the 1980’s small fluorescent bulbs that would screw intoordinary sockets was introduced.

In your science notebook draw a timeline. On that line, put the date on the top of the lineand underneath each date given in this lesson write the name of the person or groupresponsible for improving our light bulbs.

Think and write: How has the invention of the light bulb affected the space shuttle, thecamera and the automobile?

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Lesson 160 Explore light passing through mass

Name: ___________________________________________Date:________________

Gather up some materials you think light will pass through. Put them in one spot on atable. Put things you think light will not pass through in another place. Use a flashlight to test if light to test if light can pass through the solid materials you haveselected. Try water in a plastic glass. Now add some food dye to that water and see ifthat affects your results.

Record your results for each object you used.

How could you test if light goes through gas? What materials would you need for that?

Did light pass through each of the items equally as well? What was the difference?

Do you think light can pass through some solids, gases and liquids?

What do you think may happen with the water if you added something like sand, ink orinstant coffee?

Extend your experiment by thinking about designing a room from window coverings tolighting, where shadows of objects are always soft and fuzzy never sharp. What sort ofmaterials would you have to use to create this?

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What did you learn from doing this activity? Now do you think shadows are formed thesame way? How does that happen?

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Lesson 161 What can light pass through?

You have discovered that sometimes when light hits some objects it goes right through it. Other times it cannot go through the object at all or only some goes through it.

Opaque objects are materials that completely block the light. Transparent materials allow some light to go through them. Some of these are coloredand others are not. Translucent objects allow only part of the light to go through and some bounces off theobject. The glass on showers is often translucent to provide privacy.

Light passes through outer space in empty space to reach us. Empty space is opaqueand usually would not let light pass through; more about that in a later lesson.

In our daily life light can be manipulated for our use. One of the ways to control light iscalled polarization. Light travel in waves in all directions. It can be polarized by somematerials. That would make it come only in one direction.

Do you ever wear sunglasses? These may be polarized so we can see better on a brightsunny day. On bright days much of the glare we see comes from light reflecting off waterand other substances.

This reflected light is often naturally polarized to vibrate sideways. Polarizing materials insunglasses let through only the light that is vibrating up and down. This blocks glare andall other kinds of light that vibrates sideways.

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There glasses that change color too. They can be regular glasses some people weardaily. These lenses of self-tinting glasses contain very small amounts of transparent,silver containing chemical. These particles block light and darken the glass when there isa bright light. When the person goes inside, the silver particles become transparent againso, the lens lighten.

Learn your vocabulary words. Copy them in your notebook along with the definition.

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Lesson 162 Can light rays be bent?

Look at this picture. Light can “trick” your eye.

The illusion is caused when light rays from the lower part of the pencil change direction asthey go from water into air. The bending of light rays as they pass from one substanceinto another is called refraction.

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How does light affect what you see when it passes through water? Can light rays movefrom one substance into another without bending?

It is the thickness of a substance that affects lights path of traveling. The densersubstance is made of material that is packed together more tightly than the material thatmakes-up the less dense substance.

If light strikes the new material head-on, its direction is unchanged. If it strikes at anyother angle, it gets refracted into a new direction. The amount of refraction increases, asthe incoming angle gets shallower.

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Lesson 162 Can light rays be bent?

Name: _______________________________ Date: __________________________

Think and respond:

When do light rays bend?

Why did the pencil look like it was bent or in two pieces?

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Lesson 163 How Do Lenses Work?

What do you use a magnifying glass for? Howdoes that work? The glass on a magnifyingglass is usually convex. When you use it youwill enlarge whatever you wish to see. Whomay need this device?

Lenses are pieces of transparent materialswith curved surfaces that use the refraction oflight to make images. Convex lenses curveoutward. Concave lenses curve inward. Convex lenses form images by refracting lightrays together. The size and position of theimage depend on how far the object is from thelens.

Concave lenses form images by refracting light rays apart. These images are alwaysright-side up and smaller than the object.

A telescope is an instrument invented in the 17th century in the Netherlands. It is aninstrument designed for the observation of objects far away like studying stars andplanets. It is the lens in the telescope that allows you see these things.

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When would you use a pair of binoculars? Binoculars are a pair of identical or mirrorsymmetrical telescopes mounted side-by-side and aligned to point accurately in the samedirection. This allows the viewer to use both eyes when viewing distant objects. You canusually hold them with both hands. Unlike the telescope, binoculars give an enlarged,right-side up view.

Most scientists use microscopes in their work. What would they use a microscope for? How does it work? The lenses in a microscope help you see a tiny world that is invisible toyour eye. There is an eyepiece on the top. There is a piece with several different strengthlens. You move that around to the strength you need to see what you want to examine. There is a flat surface called the stage where light can come through. If you have aprepared slide you clip it on the stage. There is a lens under the stage that allows light togo through. There may be a microscope lamp to produce the light.

So there are three different ways that light and lenses are used in our life. The convex lens reflects an image upside down while the concave lens will reflect animage right-side-up.

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Lesson 164 Eyes, eyes, eyes

Do you know anything about your eye? Do you know the parts of an eye? Here is one ofthe important things about our eyes. Our eyes have a convex lens. What do youremember about a convex lens? The image will be up-side down. Why do we see theworld the way it should?

Let’s begin here. The convex lens on your eye casts an image onto the back of the eye. There is a tissue there called the retina converts the light into signals that nerves carry tothe brain. It is your brain that turns the nerve signal into a view of the world.

Draw the following:

Label the top of your paper: How the eye works.

Draw a circle with a slight bulge or “pimple like thing on front side. Leave an open spot inthe back of the eye where a tunnel filled with nerves comes out of your eye.

You may color the nerves and the outline of the eye yellow except for that very front partthat bulges.

Label the yellow outline retina. Label the opening in the back Optic nerve. Use a white line around the bulge in front and label this cornea. Use a light blue to fill in the bulge and label this pupil. Just behind the bulge place a white lens and label it lens.

Now to take the journey of an image, draw an evergreen tree out in front of the eye. Drawstraight lines from the top and bottom of the tree to the lens. At the lens make the bottomline take a turn and go to the back of the eye straight up.

Make the line from the top line and have it go from the lens straight down to the back ofthe eye. Draw a small tree upside down on the back of the eye.

So this is what was happening. Light from an object reaches the eye and is refracted bythe cornea. The refracted light then enters the eye through the pupil and travels to thelens.

The lens of the eye bends the light even more, so that it forms an image on the retina. Images that form on the retina are sent on by the optic nerve to the brain. The brain thenturns these images into your view of the world. Pretty clever!

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So why do some people need glasses or contact lens? Nearsighted eyes are not able toimprint the image on the retina. The image falls short so the lens of a glass helps it travelfurther back on the eye. These people need a concave lens to correct their vision.People who are farsighted have images that fall behind the retina. Now the glasses helpto shorten the line so the image hits the retina. These people need a lens that is convex.

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Lesson 165 Rethink what happens to light

Did you discover what the raised dots are on an elevator? They are part of a systemcalled Braille. People who are blind need Braille to know which button to push for the floorthey want the elevator to go to. The Braille alphabet is how some blind people are able toboth read and write. Research Braille to see what the raised dots mean. You could useElmer’s glue and make dots on a paper. Let them dry and feel them. That is how blindpeople can read.

In review, we have discovered that light waves bend as they travel from one kind ofsubstance to another. Lenses are used to focus light and form various kinds of images. The cornea of the eye has a lens that focuses light rays on the retina. Without thisfocusing ability, you would not be able to see things clearly.

Respond to the following in your notebook.

Give two examples for each of these types of materials: opaque, transparent andtranslucent.

Why are lenses curved?

What function does your brain play in giving you the ability to see?

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Now choose one of these activities: Write an essay that explains why lenses areimportant to you. Tell about these lenses and their uses. OR make a health poster whereyou first research something called astigmatism. Draw a diagram showing how lighttravels through an astigmatic eye. Then draw a diagram showing how cylindrical lensesare used to correct this condition.

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Lesson 166 History of the camera

Do you have a camera or does your parent have one? I bet it comes out and is used forevery special event of your life. They can record your whole life history.

One of the earliest devices with a lens was called the camera obscura, which means inLatin “dark room”. It was a closed box with a lens on the outside and a tilted mirror insidewith a glass on the top. Sounds pretty simple. The lens let light from an object into thebox. The light hit the mirror and reflected an image of the object onto the glass, which wason the top.

There was something called a “bull’seye” lantern. It was also an enclosedbox with a lens. When a light wasplaced inside the box, a narrow, brightbean shone through the lens. Thislantern was used for lighthouses.

Someone placed an image on atransparent sheet and placed itbetween the light and the lens of abull’s eye lantern. The image wasprojected outside the box. The devicebecame known as the “magic lantern”.

The lens and chamber of the eye are like a small camera Obscura. Sometimes an imageis formed either too far in front or too far in back of the eye. This can be corrected byadding other lenses in front of the eyes or glasses.

Some chemicals change color when light shines on them. Inventors put a surface coatedwith these chemicals at the back of a camera Obscura. After many improvements thisbecame the most common way of taking pictures. Now it will be called simply camera.People used to have to wait until film with the images we processed before they could seethe pictures they took with their camera. In 1944 Edwin Land created an “instant” camerausing Polaroid film. He called it the Polaroid Land camera. He researched on polarizedlight for many years. During World War II he and his company invented infrared filters,target-finding devices and night goggles. With all of this his most successful invention wasthe Polaroid camera. The cameras used photo-sensitive surface. It was used as film andphoto. You just take the picture and wait a few minutes to let the process get started. Thephoto is pulled from the camera and the developing process begins. The instant resultsare fun to see.

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The camera is still sold and is constantly improving. In 1972 the SX-70 model replacedthe wet film with dry film and developed in light. Edwin Land held 535 patents on hiscameras. He died in 1991. Though many people use a digital camera today, it isinteresting that some people still enjoy using a Polaroid camera for special events.

Now use your science notebook to see what you remember:

1. Why couldn’t people see a photo right away? The photos had to be developed firstor people didn’t want to share them right away

2. How long did it take Edwin to create the Polaroid camera? A week or a month

3. Who invented the Polaroid Land cameras? Edwin Polaroid or Edwin Land

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Lesson 167 Does a red object always look red?

Let’s try this: Take a flashlight and use it to look through a piece of colored cellophanetoward a white sheet of paper. Record what you see.

What color did the sheet look with the light going through colored cellophane.

Now change the white paper to the colored paper. Use the cellophane again but changethe white paper to the same colored paper as the cellophane.

Does the color you observe change at all?

Draw additional colored squares to view through the cellophane sheets.

In your notebook create a chart to record what you are seeing and predict why this is so. Chart each time you add another color. How does red look through the red cellophane? What happened when you looked at red squares with blue cellophane used on it? What would happen if you looked at a red paper with both red and blue cellophane? You can make white. Take a cardboard circle like what a pizza is delivered on. Divide thecircle into six equal pieces like pie shaped. Color them red, orange, yellow, green, blueand violet. Now make a hole right in the center just big enough to put a pencil through it. Put a long pencil in the center and begin spinning you circle. This should “trick” your eyesinto seeing all of the colors at one time. With the correct mixture of these colors you canproduce white light.

Our eyes pick up light in much the same way that camera does. Light enters your eyesthrough the cornea, which is the clear covering over the front of the eye. It is the corneathat bends or refracts the light. Then the iris, the colorful part of the eye opens or closes alittle to let "just enough" light through the pupil. The light passes through the lens behindthe pupil. The light is then on the retina. The retina and the electrical charges, sends asignal to the brain to understand what you see.

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You can also demonstrate a strange phenomenon called total reflection. This is when lightwaves are reflected out in all directions so you can no longer see the object at all. Curved mirrors make reflections that are unusual sizes and shapes. They reflect lightwaves at changing angles. Look at a reflection in a spoon. This is what they use in a funhouse to get some unusual views of people.

What is the outer cover of your eye called?

Your eye works like a mirror or a camera?

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Lesson 168 How do we get the color from white?

Sir Isaac Newton passed a beam of white sunlight through a prism, a triangular piece ofcut and polished glass, in a dark room. He was startled to see a band of rainbow colors. He called the color band a spectrum after a word meaning “ghostly vision”.

With a curious mind, Newton wanted to know more about the colors. Where did theycome from? He believed the white sunlight was actually a mixture of all the colors. Theprism simply spread the colors out by refracting each one at a different angle. Red isrefracted the least, violet the most.

Sir Isaac thought more about the spectral colors cast by the prism. He predicted that ifthere was a second prism the light would reline into the white light again.

He was correct. White light is really made up of many colors including red, orange, yellow,green, blue and violet.

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A raindrop works much like a prism. You can see the colors after a storm. The drops ofrain bend rays of sunlight at different angles. This causes the colors to spread out. Thenthe various colors reflect off the back of the drops into your eye. That is how rainbows areformed in the sky.

You could make a rainbow with a spray of water from a garden hose. Stand with yourback to the sun and spray a mist of water from hose. You will probably see a rainbowappear.

You can produce a rainbow inside also. Take a plastic cup about half full of water. Holdthe cup just over the edge of a table. Hold a piece of white paper directly behind the cup. Now shine a flashlight vertically through the bottom of the cup. You should see a rainbowon the paper.

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Lesson 168 How do we get the color from white?

Name: __________________________________ Date: _______________________

Respond:

How do raindrops break up the Sun’s light into different colors?

How do raindrops and prisms produce rainbow colors from white light?

When a spinner with all the colors on it spins, what color do you see?

What is white light?

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Lesson 169 Colors

A color filter is a material that absorbs certain colors of light and allows others to passthrough it. The color of an object depends on the color of the light hitting it. What if youlooked through colored cellophane sheets as color filters? For example, the redcellophane allows red light to pass through it but blocks other colors.

Try shining a flashlight on a red apple. Use the red cellophane as your filter. The applewill still look red. Try a green sheet as your filter. Since the apple can only reflect red itlooks black. Keep trying different filters to test this theory.

If you mixed equal amounts of red, green and blue light, you would get a white light andthe apple would look red. All of the colors of the spectrum can be created by mixingproper amounts of red, green and blue light. Red, green, and blue are considered primarycolors of light.

The retina of your eye reacts to color. Some cells react only to red, others only to greenand still others only to blue. If the eye is struck with all three you see white.

If your eye sees red and green light you will see yellow. So if you drew three circles thatintermixed in the middle you would have: Blue on the top circle. Where blue mixes withthe red circle it turns magenta. Where the blue touches green you see cyan. Where thered circle overlaps the green you see yellow and where it has all three overlapping it iswhite. The green circle would look yellow where it overlapped red and white where allthree intercepts.

Now you can place four cups on a piece of paper each with one dye in each. You canplay with mix colors to see if you can create these.

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Lesson 170 What happens when color is reflected?

When light hits a leaf it is white light or a light energy with all of the colors of the spectrum. Why then does the leaf appear to be green? The absorbed colors are missing in thereflected light. The reflected colors mix to produce the color of the object.

Remember that the colors that result when you blend paints are different from the colorsthat result when you blend colored lights. As you mix colored lights, you keep adding lightuntil you get white.

As you mix pigments, such as food dyes or markers or paints, you keep subtracting colorsuntil you get black. That is how black is formed at the center of the color.

Magenta, cyan, and yellow are called the primary pigments. Each absorbs one primarycolor of light and reflects the other two. When properly mixed, these pigments can createany desired color by reflecting a blend of primary colors of light.

Under white light, for example, equal amounts of magenta and cyan would produce thecolor blue. The cyan would absorb the red out of the white light and the magenta wouldabsorb the green out of the light. Only blue would be reflected. When a printer uses colors he would use yellow, magenta, cyan and black plates to makefour-color photos. The red in the final print is a combination of different amounts of yellowand magenta. The blue is a mixture of cyan and magenta. Green is a mixture of cyan andyellow. Darker colors also mix in a little black. Other colors are formed by mixing variousamounts of three or all four color plates.

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Lesson 170 What happens when color is reflected?

Name: _____________________________ Date: _____________________________


What happens when white light passes through a prism?

What are the four colors of light?

What are the four colors of primary colors of pigments?

Where in nature could you see a spectrum? Explain

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Lesson 171 How do waves move?

What happens to things in the water when a wave comes? All waves carry energy fromplace to place. The way a wave carries energy depends on the kind of wave motion.

Remember that sound waves are produced by vibrations. As a string or bar or some otherobject vibrates, it causes molecules of gas in the air to move back and forth. The energyof the vibration is carried through the air to your ear. In a similar way, sound waves travelthrough solids, liquids and gases.

Have you ever played with a slinky? When you let it go down stairs it looks like a snakemoving. It appears to go up and down. If you take a rope you can make waves with thattoo. Just lay it flat on the floor and then shake it and it will move up and down. That is how

wave particles vibrate back and forth.

Sound travels with waves of particles vibratingback and forth. The energy of the sound wavescannot travel in a vacuum, a space where there isno matter; it needs the matter particles to beheard. You can make a wave by tossing a pebble into aquiet body of water. How does a particle ofmatter move in the water as the wave moves pastit from left to right? Each particle moves in acircle.

The waves of a slinky or a rope do not move leftand right. They move up and down. So, allwaves do not move in the same way.

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Lesson 172 Are all light waves the same?

If you hold a wire to a battery and put a compass near the wire, the compass needle willmove. The electric charge moving through the wire actually created a magnetic field. Thisis an example of electromagnetism.

Electromagnetism refers to forces that come from electricity and magnetism. When anelectric charge moves in a magnetic field, it produces electromagnetic energy. The electrical and magnetic parts of the energy can carry themselves as a wave movingthrough space. Electromagnetic waves can travel without matter or through matter. Electromagnetic waves vibrate back and forth across the direction in which light travels.

Water waves are usually used as models for light waves. The wavelength is the distancefrom crest to crest. Light is not just one wavelength. It is many wavelengths. The colorsof light are different wavelengths. A prism refracts the different wavelengths differentamounts.

All of the color wavelengths travel at the same speed over 300 million meters per secondthrough empty space. It slows down when it hits matter. It travels much faster than sound. So you can see lightning before you hear thunder.

James Clerk Maxwell studied light and how it travels. He discovered that light iselectromagnetic energy. A prism refracts the different colors or wavelengths in differentamounts. It looks like red is almost a straight line while violet has many humps andbumps.

Maxwell’s work made scientist form another idea of how light travels. Light travels in tinybundles of energy. Scientists call the bundles photons.

Scientists use both models to explain light. Your eye will pick up only so many photons oflight. We can see the wavelengths of light that make up the colors of light.

The red light is longer than violet that is shorter. We cannot see these wavelengths. Together all these wavelengths of light, the visible ones and invisible ones, are called theelectromagnetic spectrum.

Although we cannot see wavelengths longer than red or shorter than violet, we can detectthem. Scientist use an instrument called a spectroscope to detect forms of light we cannotsee.

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Lesson 173 Invisible Wavelengths

In this lesson you will learn about wavelengths of light that are longer than red and shorterthan violet waves and have many uses in our daily lives.

Have you ever fallen and had to have a doctor checkto see if you had a broken bone? How do they dothat? They take an X-ray of your bone. The shortestwavelength of the spectrum is a gamma ray or X-ray. It can pass right through most objects. Thicker ordenser objects tend to absorb X-rays. This meansthat X-rays can produce a picture as they passthrough an arm or leg. The denser objects such asyour bone will show clearly. This is an example of awave shorter than violet.

Ultraviolet light or UV light is also shorter than violet waves. It can produce chemical changes. It can produce vitamin Din your body, which you need for healthy bones and teeth. Hospitals use ultraviolet light to kill harmful bacteria inequipment they use. The UV light can cause harm. UV lightfrom the Sun can cause a sunburn. It can cause cancer ofthe skin

False-color image of the Sun's corona as seen in deep ultraviolet by the Extreme ultraviolet Imaging

Earth is protected from much of the Sun’s UV light by the ozone layer. This is part of theupper atmosphere. However, some chemicals produced by factories are eating away atthe ozone layer. This allows UV rays to reach Earth.

Radio waves are the longest waves of the electromagnetic spectrum. You cannot see them or hear them. Broadcasting stations use them tocarry signals in a kind of code like AM or FM. In AM the height of thewaves is changed to carry the signal. In FM the frequency changes. The number of your favorite radio station represents the frequency at

which the station sends out radio waves. These waves can be heard or seen as in onyour television.

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Radar is like what some animals use with their high frequency sound. The echo of thewaves helps the animals locate things. Radar stands for radio detecting and ranging. Radar sues radio waves that reflect off many objects. Weather forecasters detect rain andfog with radar.

Now in your home you may have a microwave oven. Microwaves are shortwave radiowaves. The water in food absorbs the waves quickly. The energy from the absorbedmicrowaves speeds up the water molecules inside the food. The food is cooking from theinside out. It uses less energy than a regular oven for cooking your food.

“Just beyond red” is what infrared means. It is next to visible red waves in the spectrum. The sun’s infrared waves warm you. All objects give off infrared rays. Warmer objectsgive off more than cooler objects. Photographs can detect infrared light with electronicsensors.

In your science notebook respond to the following questions.

What kinds of electromagnetic energy have shorter wavelengths than visible light?What kinds of electromagnetic energy have longer wavelengths than visible light?

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Lesson 174 What are lasers?

Watch while things are being scanned at a grocery store. Each thing is moved across aplate glass. What do you think is under that glass plate? You are correct if you guess it isa laser light.

Lasers are devices that produce a thin stream of light. Why is the laser light so special?Regular light from a bulb or a candle has many wavelengths all mixed together. Thesewaves are move away from the bulb or candle in a spread out way. It gets weaker andweaker as they travel further away.

On the other hand, lasers produce light that does not spread out nor does it get weaker. Itis a focused, strong light. A red ruby laser is produced by absorbing flashes of light from acoiled tube. Inside the ruby the absorbed light bounces back and forth between mirrors atthe ends of the ruby. The ruby gives off a light of just a few close wavelengths. Thewavelengths are all the same color and are all lined up. The beam that comes out of theruby is narrow and direct.

Another use for the laser is surgery. The strong beam is powerful enough to cut throughmany different types of materials or controlled enough to use on human flesh by an expert. The direct beam makes it most useful. A weak laser beam is used in CD players. Otherlaser beams can be used to melt metals and crack open granite.

Remember light has many wavelengths. Only some are visible. Radar waves helpforecasters predict the weather. X rays help dentists and doctors check for cavities andbroken bones. Radio and TV use invisible waves of “light” energy.

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Name: __________________________________________________Date:___________

Choose the best word to each of the following:

Concave mirror Convex lensTransparentTranslucentElectromagnetic spectrum

PrismPrimary colorOpaqueLight rayConvex mirror

1. The security mirror in a store is ______________________________________.

2. Red, blue, or green each is a __________________________________ of light.

3. Material that allows some light pass through but may give an unclear view is

__________________________________________________________________

4. An outward curved lens is a __________________________________________

5. A straight-line narrow beam of light traveling out from a source is a ___________.

6. A mirror with a curve in on its shiny side is a (n)____________________________

7. Light cannot pass through this material __________________________________

8. X rays and microwaves are part of the ___________________________________

9. Light can pass right through this material _________________________________

10. White light is broken up into a rainbow of colors by a(n)______________________

Which is translucent: a car windshield or a concrete block? ________________________

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Circle the correct answer.

This reduces glare in sunglasses: transparent or polarized

Light can easily pass through: translucent or opaque

Which isn't found in the electromagnetic spectrum? sound waves or infrared light?

Light is a form of: electricity or energy

Thing and Respond:

How does a company use TV advertising with light and color? Write a paragraph giving

examples.

Remember the difference between primary colors and the primary colors of pigments. Why would you not be able to combine colors of paints and get the same results ascombining colors of light? Write a paragraph to describe this.

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Lesson 176 Review the concepts of light

Light is a form of energy that travels in squiggly lines called waves. Light energy ismagnet and it is electrical. Most of these electromagnet waves cannot be seen. Light energy is made up of tiny particles, called photons. Photons group together in awave and make a light ray.

If you had a prism white light can be separated up into red, orange, yellow, green, blue,indigo and violet. The colors of a rainbow are what can be seen. Each differentwavelength has different energy. The longer the wavelength the less energy it has. Light also travels in all directions from its primary source. What is our primary source oflight…the sun! Light comes in form of rays. Light travels at 186,000 miles per second. Light can travel through empty space. Light energy can be absorbed or it can be reflected. Light can also be refracted or bent in different directions.

When light passes through transparent matter, this is called transmission. The sun lightsup the world around us.

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Lesson 177 Someone to know?

A curious mind can find out many things about the world around us. One young girl didjust that. She collected 30 jars of the family’s rose bushes. She collected one bumblebee,one yellow jacket, and one wasp. She observed how different foods affected the insectsand how the different insects got along with each other.

This young scientist was Shirley Jackson. She was one of the great nuclear physicists ofher time. In 1973, Dr. Jackson became the first African-American woman to receive adoctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She studied particles that aresmaller than atoms and the forces that bind these particles together.

In 1948, scientists learned that the atoms in silicon and a few other materials could beused to transmit electricity. These materials are called semiconductors. The discovery ofsemiconductors eventually led to the invention of the computer. Dr. Jackson’s laterresearch on semiconductors helped develop a semiconductor laser. Every time you playyour CD player, you use a semiconductor laser.

In 1995, Dr. Jackson became the first African-American woman to head the NuclearRegulatory Commission (NRC). It became her job to make sure that our nuclear plantswere safe and to find safe ways to store nuclear wastes. When she found out that someplants were ignoring NRC safety rules, she shut them down. She also increased plantinspections so that problems could be found more quickly.

Dr, Jackson is currently the President of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. She is the firstAfrican-American woman to lead a national research university. She hopes that all her“firsts” will inspire other students to become scientists.

What discovery led to the invention of the computer? What were Dr. Jackson’s two duties as head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission?

What is a Nuclear Engineer? If you are interested in physics, you may want to be a nuclear engineer. A nuclearengineer works with nuclear power, the strongest source of energy known. Nuclear powercan be used to produce weapons and generate electricity. It can also be used for medicalpurposes such as taking X-rays.

Many nuclear engineers work at nuclear power plants, making sure the plant is runningsafely. Some work in laboratories conducting research on atomic particles and how to usethe energy contained in the atom.

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Lesson 178 Your skeleton

What do we have bones for? What is the function of a skeleton? Do you know how manybones you have in your body?

Our skeleton is a supporting frame. It ismade up of bones. The skeleton hasseveral jobs.

It gives the body its shape and protectsthe body organs.

It works with muscles to move the body.

There are 206 bones in the skeleton. Each has a size and shape that best fitsits job.

The long strong bones support thebody’s weight.

The major bones are: skull, clavicle(shoulder), humerus (upper arm), ribs,illium (hip bone), vertebra (back bone),femur (upper leg), tibia (lower leg) andpatella (knee).

Skeletons need to joints. A joint is aplace where two or more bones meet. Joints can be classified into three majorgroups: immovable joints, partlymovable joints, and movable joints.

Immovable joints are places wherebones fit together too tightly to move. Nearly all the 29 bones in the skull meetat immovable joints. Only the lower jawcan move. Partly movable joints are places wherebones can move only a little. Ribs areconnected to the breastbone with joints.

Wikimedia Commons: Author: Furfur. Eigenes Werk (own work) - Deutsche Übersetzung von (German translation of) Image:Human_skeleton_front.svg

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A gliding joint is movable. In the hand and wrist there are small bones called gliding joints. The bones can slide against one another. These joints allow some movement in alldirections.

The hip has a ball-and-socket joint. Here the ball of one bone fits into the socket or cup, ofanother bone. This allows the bones to move back and forth, in a circle, and side to side.The hinge joint can be found in the knee. It is similar to a door hinge. It allows bones tomove back and forth in one direction.

Then there is the pivot joint found in the neck. It allows the head to move up and down,and side to side.

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Lesson 179 Two more systems of the body

Exercise will help our muscles function for us. There are three types of muscles: skeletalmuscles, cardiac muscle and smooth muscle.

The muscles that are connected to the bones are called skeletal muscles. They areattaché to bones by a tough cord called a tendon. Skeletal muscles pull bones to move. They do not push bones.

Cardiac muscles arefound in only one place: the heart. The walls ofthe heart are made ofstrong cardiac muscles. When cardiac musclescontract, they squeezeblood out of the heart. When they relax, theheart fills with blood.

Smooth muscles makeup internal organs andblood vessels. Smoothmuscles in the lungshelp a person breathe. Those muscles in theblood vessels helpcontrol blood flowaround the body.

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Your circulatorysystem consists ofthe heart, bloodvessels and blood. Circulation is the flowof blood through thebody. Blood is aliquid that cells, andplatelets. Red bloodcells carry oxygenand nutrients to cells. White blood cellswork to fight germsthat enter the body. Platelets are cellfragments that makethe blood clots.

Your heart is amuscle that is aboutthe size of your fist. Itbeats about 70 to 90times a minute,pumping bloodthrough the bloodvessels. Arteriescarry blood awayfrom the heart. Somearteries carry blood tothe lungs, where thecells pick up oxygen. The arteries carryoxygen-rich bloodfrom the lungs to allother parts of the

body. Veins carry blood from other parts of the body back to the heart. Blood in mostveins carries the waste released by cells and has little oxygen. Blood flows from arteriesto veins through narrow vessels called capillaries.

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Lesson 179 Two more systems of the body

Name: ________________________________________________Date:_____________

Draw your own picture of how the blood travels through the body.

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Lesson 180 The Heart and Respiratory System

Let’s think about out heart. It has two chambers or sides. The right side is separated from the left with a thick muscular wall. Each of the sides or chambers has blood in them. The lower chamber is called the ventricle. Blood enters the heart through the vena cava, which is like a tube. The blood leaves the heart through the aorta at the top of the heart.

Wikimedia Commons: Attribution - Zoofari

There are pulmonary arteries, one on the upper part of the heart. This carries blood from the body into the lungs. Here carbon dioxide leaves the blood to be exhaled by the lungs. Fresh oxygen enters the blood to be carried to every cell of your body. Then blood returns from the lungs to the heart through the pulmonary veins.

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The work of the heart is to exchange our blood. The right atrium fills with blood, which squeezes blood into right ventricle. The blood is then squeezed the blood into the pulmonary artery. That is the travel “plan” to the lungs from the heart.

The movement of the blood from the lungs starts with the left atrium filling. It squeezes blood into the left ventricle. The left ventricle squeezes blood into the aorta. The process of getting and using oxygen in the body is called respiration. As you inhale air is pulled into the nose or mouth. Then the air travels down into the trachea. In the chest the trachea divides into two bronchial tubes. One bronchial tube enters each lung. These branch into smaller tubes called bronchioles.

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At the end of the bronchiole are tiny air sacs called alveoli. The alveoli exchange carbon dioxide for oxygen. Oxygen comes from the air a person breathes. Two main muscles control breathing. One is located between the ribs. This is a dome-shaped sheet of muscle called the diaphragm.

To inhale, the diaphragm contracts and pulls down. Other muscles pull the ribs up and out. This makes more room in the chest. Air rushes into the lungs and fills the space. To exhale, the diaphragm relaxes and returns to it dome shape. The lugs get smaller and force the air out.

It is sort of like having two balloons with a hand under them that push and relax so air can come into the balloon. The air you breathe is about 21 percent oxygen. The blood in the capillaries of your lungs has very little oxygen. The blood has a higher concentration of carbon dioxide than air.

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